transfer station

 

photo courtesy of KUAC

When we lived in both Fairbanks and North Pole, there was no home garbage collection. Instead, we brought our trash to the transfer station, a fenced in open area lined with dumpsters. Shortly after we got to Fairbanks, in an effort to discourage dumpster diving and encourage re-use, they built a covered platform where people could leave things they no longer wanted, but could be used by others. One day when I wasn’t feeling well and was only half awake, I heard someone on the radio talking about the transfer station mall and my muddled mind struggled to figure out where that was. Then I had a chuckle when I realized what she was talking about.

We used the transfer station ‘mall’ both ways. We would sometimes find useful items there. Once, in North Pole, we had a funny experience. Daughter and I had a running joke for years about kitty couches. Patterns for crocheted kitty couches were all the rage at the time and she used to tell me over and over again that I needed to make several for our cats. I resisted. Not my kind of project and besides, they had many boxes lined with crocheted blankets they seemed to like just fine. By the time we were in North Pole, she had moved away from Alaska, but one day as we were driving out of the transfer station, I suddenly spotted something. ‘KITTY COUCH!’ I yelled, ‘STOP!’ Poor Bill jumped so high that he almost put his head through the truck roof as he slammed on the brakes. I jumped out and went to examine the miniature couch. I think this miniature couch was for children and not cats, but it could become a kitty couch and so it did. We brought it home and put it upstairs in the cabin by the door to the porch. Two of the cats, who normally did not want anything to do with one another, shared that couch, always one on the left side and the other on the right. A truce was called when the kitty couch was in use and each of them had their spot.

We also used the transfer station to leave things for others. When we were leaving the house in Fairbanks, thinking we would be going to Maine, we brought a lot of stuff there, including a set of dishes. I had them in a box and was carrying them to the platform when I was stopped by a guy just hanging out there, spending some time sitting on the tailgate of his large pickup truck. ‘Whatcha got there?’ he asked. I tilted the box so he could see what it contained. ‘Go ahead and stick it right in here, please,’ he said. So I did. He had other things in his truck, so I guess he’d been there for a while.

The woman I heard on the radio that day had picked up a beautiful doll house and many accessories at the transfer station—her daughter loved it. Of course, people put junk there, too, but mostly they were good about what they left there and it was always neat and clean. Because it was covered, it was protected from the elements. We could use such a place right now as the books pile up around us. We have boxes of books that we’ve read since the lockdowns began. We don’t want to keep them, but with charity shops closed and no wee free libraries in this town, we have nowhere to bring them. We have considered putting a box outside with a sign saying ‘free books, help yourself,’ but we have not had enough dry weather to do that yet. Meanwhile, new books somehow seem to keep coming and the piles keep growing! Every time we go to the recycling centre with our tins and glass, we think about how great it would be if there was a covered area for people to leave some of the things they bring up there. Many times we see perfectly good items that people could use, but they get rained on and ruined. Sad.