THE LANDFILL vs THE DUMP

I was hauling asphalt today up Hwy. 87 to
where they are widening the road .

From the Hot Plant to the job site I made six
trips up and down the Hwy. passing the landfill
each time and on the fourth trip up it struck me .

When in hell did we start calling it the landfill ?
Sometime in the last 35 years people started
calling it the landfill instead of the dump .

When I was a kid Pop would tell me -
Before you take off to play Saturday I want you
to help me load {whatever it happened to be}
into the pick up and go to THE DUMP .

He always called it the dump , everyone we
knew called it the dump , I always called it the dump .

Until seven years ago when I came off driving
long haul and started driving local construction
[sometimes we haul dirt in to bury the trash]

I started calling it the landfill because that's
what was on the paper work .

Suddenly at that moment I felt like I had just
lost part of my childhood .

Maybe it's silly to be so sentimental about
what we call that big ass hole where we put
our trash....or maybe it's something else .

I MISS YOU POP

APRIL 1936 --- DECEMBER 2004