On Dumpster Diving: An Essay from Travels with Lizbeth
By Lars Eighner
()
About this ebook
Related to On Dumpster Diving
Related ebooks
The Fight for Survival: Hell In Life Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSober.House. (My Story) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsEveryday Dad: A Memoir About Single Parenting Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDirty Kids: Chasing Freedom with America's Nomads Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSaving Sarah: One Mother's Battle Against the Health Care System to Save Her Daughter's Life Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLiving at the Edge of the World: A Teenager's Survival in the Tunnels of Grand Central Station Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Against the Odds: Surviving the World’s Worst Tsunami and Overcoming Trauma Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Ward of the State: Hell Through Heaven Eyes Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Mole People: Life in the Tunnels Beneath New York City Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Color Blind: A Memoir Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5At the feet of a Dying Giant Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Thousand Paper Cranes Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsCar Crash: A Memoir of the Aftermath Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Generation Oxy: From High School Wrestlers to Pain Pill Kingpins Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Acid Attack: A Journalist's War With Organised Crime Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsInto The God's Light Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPlane Crash at Buck Creek: Part Eight of the Travis Lee Series Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSummary of Jennifer Saginor's Playground Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsHappy Ending Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Growing Up Fast Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5American Voyeur: Dispatches From the Far Reaches of Modern Life Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Atmospheric Disturbances: Scenes from a Marriage Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSummary of Alyssa Milano's Sorry Not Sorry Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTen Days in a Mad-House Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBouncing Back: I've Survived Everything … and I Mean Everything … and You Can Too! Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5I, Justine: An Analog Memoir Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Lookout For Shorts: A Prison Memoir Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSweet Hell on Fire: A Memoir of the Prison I Worked In and the Prison I Lived In Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Turbulence: A True Story of Survival Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Fall or Fly: The Strangely Hopeful Story of Foster Care and Adoption in Appalachia Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Personal Memoirs For You
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry Into Values Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Lost Connections: Uncovering the Real Causes of Depression – and the Unexpected Solutions Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5I'm Glad My Mom Died Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Maybe You Should Talk to Someone: A Therapist, HER Therapist, and Our Lives Revealed Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Glass Castle: A Memoir Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Stash: My Life in Hiding Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Stolen Life: A Memoir Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Child Called It: One Child's Courage to Survive Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Dry: A Memoir Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Everything I Know About Love: A Memoir Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Yes Please Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Woman in Me Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World's Most Dangerous Man Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Just Mercy: a story of justice and redemption Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Down the Rabbit Hole: Curious Adventures and Cautionary Tales of a Former Playboy Bunny Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5I'll Be Gone in the Dark: One Woman's Obsessive Search for the Golden State Killer Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Bad Mormon: A Memoir Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Maybe You Should Talk to Someone: the heartfelt, funny memoir by a New York Times bestselling therapist Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Becoming Free Indeed: My Story of Disentangling Faith from Fear Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Mommie Dearest Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Son of Hamas: A Gripping Account of Terror, Betrayal, Political Intrigue, and Unthinkable Choices Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Solutions and Other Problems Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Pity the Reader: On Writing with Style Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Man of Two Faces: A Memoir, A History, A Memorial Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Choice: Embrace the Possible Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Mediocre Monk: A Stumbling Search for Answers in a Forest Monastery Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5I Hope They Serve Beer In Hell Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5
Related categories
Reviews for On Dumpster Diving
0 ratings0 reviews
Book preview
On Dumpster Diving - Lars Eighner
Begin Reading
Table of Contents
About the Author
Copyright Page
Thank you for buying this
St. Martin’s Press ebook.
To receive special offers, bonus content,
and info on new releases and other great reads,
sign up for our newsletters.
Or visit us online at
us.macmillan.com/newslettersignup
For email updates on the author, click here.
The author and publisher have provided this e-book to you for your personal use only. You may not make this e-book publicly available in any way. Copyright infringement is against the law. If you believe the copy of this e-book you are reading infringes on the author’s copyright, please notify the publisher at: us.macmillanusa.com/piracy.
This chapter was composed while the author was homeless.
The present tense has been preserved.
Long before I began Dumpster diving I was impressed with Dumpsters, enough so that I wrote the Merriam-Webster research service to discover what I could about the word Dumpster. I learned from them that it is a proprietary word belonging to the Dempster Dumpster company. Since then I have dutifully capitalized the word, although it was lowercased in almost all the citations Merriam-Webster photocopied for me. Dempster’s word is too apt. I have never heard these things called anything but Dumpsters. I do not know anyone who knows the generic name for these objects. From time to time I have heard a wino or hobo give some corrupted credit to the original and call them Dipsy Dumpsters.
I began Dumpster diving about a year before I became homeless.
I prefer the word scavenging and use the word scrounging when I mean to be obscure. I have heard people, evidently meaning to be polite, use the word foraging, but I prefer to reserve that word for gathering nuts and berries and such, which I do also according to the season and the opportunity. Dumpster diving seems to me to be a little too cute and, in my case, inaccurate because I lack the athletic ability to lower myself into the Dumpsters as the true divers do, much to their increased profit.
I like the frankness of the word scavenging, which I can hardly think of without picturing a big black snail on an aquarium wall. I live from the refuse of others. I am a scavenger. I think it a sound and honorable niche, although if I could I would naturally prefer to live the comfortable consumer life, perhaps—and only perhaps—as a slightly less wasteful consumer, owing to what I have learned as a scavenger.
While Lizbeth and I were still living in the shack on Avenue B as my savings ran out, I put almost all my sporadic income into rent. The necessities of daily life I began to extract from Dumpsters. Yes, we ate from them. Except for jeans, all my clothes came from Dumpsters. Boom boxes, candles, bedding, toilet paper, a virgin male love doll, medicine, books, a typewriter, dishes, furnishings, and change, sometimes amounting to many dollars—I acquired many things from the Dumpsters.
I have learned much as a scavenger. I mean to put some of what I have learned down here, beginning with the practical art of Dumpster diving and proceeding to the abstract.
WHAT IS SAFE to eat?
After all, the finding of objects is becoming something of an urban