Sunday school and church were a couple hours past; dinner, about half that. The recliner was kicked clear back, soothing music played in the background, and all was right with the world. Then the telephone jangled me from mid-doze. By the time I'd clambered out of the chair and silenced the noise, life was returning.

"Hello," I answered, as cheerfully as possible under the circumstances.

"What makes folks do that?" a man's voice demanded.

"Do what?"

"Be so trashy."

"I'm sorry, friend, but you must have called the wrong number."

"Only if you ain't that Leatherman fella that writes for the newspaper." I was beginning to understand up, but confusion's gray cloud still hovered overhead.

"Yeah, I'm him. What can I do for you?"

"You can tell people to take their trash home where it belongs! That's what trash cans are for."

"I'm not following you. Isn't this something the police should handle?" "The police can't go on the Parkway. That's where I'm talking about." I slid a stool out from beneath the counter and prepared for a long session about something I was beginning to understand. A pen and notepad prepared me for whatever would come next.

"You want me to write something that'll stop people from throwing trash on the Parkway?"

"Yep, that's what I want."

"Friend, I hate litter as much as anyone else, but why does this bother you so much?"

" 'Cause I have to pick it up!"

"Do you work for the Blue Ridge Parkway?"

"Nope. Well, in a way I do. They don't pay me, or nothing. I just pick up trash because it looks so nasty scattered up and down both sides of the road."

"The Parkway's something like 400 miles long! How much of it do you keep clean?"

The voice laughed. "I don't pick up along all of it. Just the piece from 21 highway to Saddle Mountain Church."

It didn't take long to guess the distance involved. "That's pretty close to ten miles. How long does it take to pick up ten miles of trash?"

"About three hours, and I'm out there two or three times a week. Last year I picked up close to 500 pounds on that one little piece of road. Beer cans, whiskey bottles, paper napkins, empty soda pops, drink cups, wadded-up cigarette packs, you know, stuff like that. Last year somebody even throwed out one of them white plastic chairs. Trash. It's all trash!"

I couldn't believe anyone would spend six to ten hours a week picking up litter. But, then, I can't imagine people trashing the roadside, either. My brief silence prompted him to continue.

"I've looked all up and down the Parkway, and no place else is that trashy, so it's probably not folks just passing through. Reckon the ones making all that mess work in town and live in-between there somewhere? You know, maybe after they get off work they pick them up a hamburger for dinner, and a beer or two, then throw out the sack and all before they get home?"

"Your guess is as good as mine, but that sounds likely."

"Well, you ought to write something that'll make them quit!"

"If getting caught and paying a fine for littering won't do it, nothing I write will help much. Have you seen anyone throw trash out of a car on the Parkway?"

"Nope. But if I do, they'll sure get turned in! Are you gonna write something about it?"

I'd run out of ideas, and my disturbed caller hadn't offered any more of his own. "Suppose I write it, and you let me know how well it works."

"Sure! I'll weigh all the trash I pick up this month and we'll see."

"Okay. Let me know if folks have quit littering the Parkway."

"If they're still dumping their trash out there, will you write something else?"

I stifled my immediate reaction. "If what I write doesn't work the first time, why should I do it again?"

"Cause it might be just a few trashy people making all this mess, and maybe they never saw what you wrote the first time."

"This could go on all summer, and the Parkway'd still get littered. It won't take long for me to run out of things to write."

"You come out here and help me pick up all this junk, then you'll write about it forever!"

"I'll put something together that'll help them understand what a mess they're making."

"Okay. But just knowing's not enough. It has to make ‘em quit! Hauling all that smelly garbage around on a bicycle's no fun!"

"On a bicycle? You pick up trash from a bicycle?"

"Yep. Do you have a bike?"

"Not one to use while I pick up trash along the Parkway!"

"Then you'd better write something real good!"

I heard a laugh before the line went dead. His comments hovered around my head the rest of the day. Picturing this simple man riding a bicycle loaded down with other people's trash still haunts me. Especially the ten-hour hole in it knocks his summer.

Folks, please don't litter the Parkway and our county's other roads. These mountains are too pretty for such trashiness. Take your beer bottles and drink cups and cigarette packs and all that other junk home and dump it into your own trash can.

I'm not your mother, and neither is that poor, overworked bicyclist.