Letters

Letter 19

November 28th, 2004

Dear Dad,

            My boss let me come in and work early today. I had nothing else planned, so I thought, “Why not?” Today was slow, which was expected. Winter’s coming and it’s cold out there.

            After work, I just walked on the docks. The sea was a bit foggy, but I liked this calm setting. It was a little quiet and I had nothing on my mind. I walked on the beach, trying to find any unbroken shells, but all I found was trash being washed up on the beach. I couldn’t help but pick up the trash and throw it away. Someone passed by me and asked if I was doing it for community service. I said no. I just told him that I didn’t like how the beach was dirty. That’s just something that bothers me, pollution on beaches, lakes, ponds, forests, rivers, and so much more. It’s like nobody cares anymore about the planet. They’d complain that the beaches are dirty, but nobody does anything about it. They just throw their trash on the ground thinking that it’s no big deal and they’ll complain about other people’s trash. Sometimes I like to stare out into the sea and pretend that I’m thousands of miles away from all civilization and from all people. I like to do the same in the forest, just to keep in touch with nature, but then I see a ripped up plastic bag and it ruins everything.

            I continue picking up trash and I suddenly find it relaxing doing this. I know you wouldn’t want me doing this, but I just like doing things like this. When I got back to Uncle Alex’s house, I found out that I spent about three hours on the beach, cleaning it. Uncle Alex asked me why I was out for so long. I told him that I was picking up the trash at the beach. He told me exactly what you would have said to me, but who else is going to do it? Someone has to do it.

            Uncle Alex just shrugged and told me to just keep doing things that I like doing. He said that I never harmed anyone or anything anyways. If anything, I just like making things better.

Your son,

Rico