Suburban Turmoil

As I returned home yesterday morning after taking my son to preschool, I noticed something ABSOLUTELY SHOCKING.

Our neighbors across the street had put their trash out on the curb.

They had done this even though the garbage truck doesn’t come until Saturday.

I know, right? WEIRD.

“What on earth?” I said aloud, pulling into my driveway. Our neighbors are very meticulous people. They’re not the sort to break homeowner’s association rules and put out their trash days before the truck arrives. Why would they do such a thing? Why? WHY? WHY?

The morning wore on and I tried to ignore that lonely trashcan sitting out on our cul-de-sac… but I found myself returning to the window every so often to gaze at it with a furrowed brow. One thing I like about living in the suburbs is its predictability. But this trashcan was totally unpredictable. Its presence rocked the foundation of all I believed in. It represented, standing there with its bags and its boxes spilling out of the top, a huge tear in the fabric of humanity.

“Why, Steve?” I mumbled aloud from the window. “Why would you do such a thing? Why?”

Unsettled and answerless, I went about my work, only to find when I left in the afternoon to pick up the kids that another neighbor had put his trash out on the curb as well. A few minutes later, I returned home again and saw that a third neighbor had put out the trash.

This strange situation had just gotten stranger.

People on my street began arriving home from work. A group of them congregated outside my house, gesticulating in confusion and pointing at the trash cans. “There’s no holiday this week,” I imagined them saying. “Why did Steve put out his trash? And Ned? And Larry?” “Should we put out our trash as well?” “WHAT COULD THIS MEAN???!!!”

The phone rang.

“I just wanna know why Steve has his trash out,” my next door neighbor said breathlessly into the phone.

“I want to know the same thing!” I responded.

“Well, I saw that Larry had his trash out, too, and when I pulled in the driveway, I saw Ned bringing his trash out. I asked him why he was doing it and he said, ‘I don’t know!'”

“It’s a mystery,” I whispered.

As we said our goodbyes, I noticed Steve, the man at the center of this perplexing conundrum, come out from his garage. As the neighbors looked on, he quietly walked to the end of his driveway and wheeled his full trashcan back to his garage.

Collectively, we breathed a sigh of relief.

All was well with the world again.

You see, my friends, there is plenty of drama to be found in the suburbs.

You just have to be a little more creative when it comes to finding it.