The Forgotten

Saturday was a perfect day for the Daffodil Festival. While that was going on, I had the rest of Hubbard Park pretty much to myself.

Visit #1134, Saturday 28 April 18, 3:50-5:30PM, 2.2 miles.

Temps in the low 70's, sunny.

First, I'd like to wish myself a happy tenth anniversary. I enrolled in the Meriden Conservation Commission's Adopt A Park program in April of 2008. I had already been maintaining the trails themselves for ten years; now I would add litter, graffiti, and whatnot to my repertoire. I get emotional when I look back at that first bag of litter so long ago, which I had bronzed and is hanging from my rearview mirror now.

Here's to another then years!

With the Daffodil Festival occupying the south end of Hubbard Park, there was no way I or anybody else was going to find parking at the park, so I ventured to the Berlin end of things and parked. There were quite a number of cars already parked there; it  was good to see people still wanted to enjoy Hubbard Park's natural offerings and did whatever it took to make it happen.

I was on another one of my special missions this week: There's a short trail near the water tank which for decades has been littered with broken glass and little or none of it is recent vintage.

I'm told there used to be a house situated on the land where the water treatment plant now sits, and it was commonplace way back when to merely toss empty bottles from the house, over the slope. Doesn't sound right to me. I suppose it could have been the result of construction crews from when the plant was built. The reason is irrelevant; it was time to clean it up.

Hundreds of pieces of old style bottles were frequently found. I used a collapsible rake to comb the dirt downslope, and a folding shovel to bag it. It would have been a futile effort to try and sift the glass from the dirt and rocks, so it all went into trash bags.

It wasn't a perfect job but it was a start to something I'd remember and forget every time I'd use that trail. I expect the soil to yield more glass in years to come.

Now I had three VERY heavy bags. I lugged them to the water treatment plant and left them. One water department worker isn't going to be very happy come Monday morning.

Walking the road back to my car, I kept listening to flowers other than daffodils complain to me about being forgotten. "Yo! What about me?! Don't I deserve a festival too, or am I just a weed?"

Best I could do to assure them they were appreciated was to pick up litter around them as I headed north. They still want their own festival...