Mike C.

Where do you suppose a fascination for garbage could come from? Well, isn't it often said that one man's garbage is another man's treasure? It would appear that Dr. Mike C. is that other man since he has collected more garbage than any other person in the history of the world! Dr. C. feels that by collecting, saving, and studying garbage one can learn a great deal about the people it came from. And furthermore, one can discover great truths about the culture which generates certain kinds of waste materials. Knowing that the public in general would like to hear more about this interesting, though rather lonely and smelly young man, we have set about to study Dr. C. and what he stands for (including a bit of research on the good doctors own garbage, but more about that later). We first need to ask how it all started.

Back in that golden year of 1993-4, young Mike more or less blindly enrolled in a certain elective class expecting it to be your typical, run‑of­-the‑mill, state‑of‑the‑art, middle school offering. Much to his surprise, it turned out to be the winter trimester Creative Expressions class taught by the one and only Legendary Mr. Christopherson! Mike was so full of joy when he realized this that he jumped all around the room in little circles for the entire first period of the class, making little happy squeal­ing noises. This somewhat abnormal behavior, reminiscent of 6th grad­ers, at first led the Legendary Mr. Christopherson to misjudge the boy's true potential, however, fortunately, the great teacher soon saw through this jittery facade to the real garbage‑oriented child inside.

Yes, for while it is true that this wonder‑teacher often took children who were no more than lumps of unformed clay, so to speak, and, from scratch, turned them into the most well‑developed, successful young people imaginable, it is also true that, just as often, a youngster came to that gifted teacher with some sort of interest, talent, or ability already born within. Such was the case with young Mike. Only a teacher with an amazing, prophetic insight into a person's character could have recognized that here was a student with a future in garbage‑-the Legendary Mr. Christopherson was just such a teacher, naturally.

There were clues to young Mike's future that even a layman prophet might have seen: the book bag crammed full of old, useless papers, gum wrappers, sandwich bags, used Kleenex, and various soiled rags and so forth; pockets stuffed with scraps of paper on which were notes, written throughout the course of the last three years; the tendency for the hood on the back of his coat to gather all manner of broken paint brushes, chunks of colored chalk and crayon, pencils, pens, quills, and cuneiform styli (these latter two items being the result of the Legendary Mrs. Martin, fantastic English/French and writing teacher (somewhat handicapped by a typical French outlook on life) wishing to introduce students to historic, as well as modern, forms of expres­sion); and finally, the fact that the near‑legendary middle school custodian always had to come into class after Mike had been there to sweep up the general pile of debris generated by the boy's mere presence.

None but the Legendary Mr. Christopherson could see beneath this messy exterior to the even more messy interior. A prime example of the great teacher's insight may be highlighted by examining but one of the many incidents in which Mike was encouraged to follow his garbage instincts. Noting that young Mike seemed to feel left out when his close friend, the rather less messy Brandon B., was presented with a pile of cardboard boxes to play in, the Legendary Mr. Christopherson rounded up a dozen garbage cans, both metal and plastic, and turned them over to young Mike with a card saying, "They're all for you, I know you'll feel right at home here, Mike. Enjoy!" Thus, while young Brandon was playing hide and seek in his cardboard boxes (see the Brandon B. story), young Mike was happily crawling from can to can, inspecting each and every scrap of garbage he could lay his hands on (for you see, the great teacher had the inspired foresight to present the boy with cans already partly full of garbage, providing the joy of discovery as the cans were searched, but also providing ample room for the boy to add garbage of his own to his collection).

The day finally came when young Mike backed a large garbage truck (a middle school graduation gift from his parents, who were immensely pleased that their son had begun to focus on his future) up to the entrance of the classroom and removed the augmented collection of fifty‑one garbage cans from the building (producing a sigh of relief from the near‑legendary middle school custodian who had found it difficult to clean a room where some garbage was for throwing, and other garbage was for keeping, the final decision occasionally becoming a blur in his mind).

Then, after four difficult years of garbage suppression, owing to a misguided high school rule about cleanliness and the inability of getting a parking permit in the student lot for his odorous truck, young Mike was presented with a scholarship to PLU (Pacific Labyrinth University) which held its classes in the many caves and tunnels which honeycombed the whole Parkland area. This energetic young man soon had earned his doctor's degree, the prestigious D.R., or Doctor of Refuse, and from there his garbage oriented star kept rising higher and higher.

We are all waiting breathlessly for Dr. C.’s first book, You're Your Garbage, which is expected to rock the scien­tific world due to the many far‑reaching conclusions the doctor has made. But, now to clear up the matter stated above concerning the good doctor's own garbage: well, as you might have suspected, there is none to be found! Dr. C. never throws out anything at all where others could find it.

And he still proudly retains those twelve cans given to him by the Legendary Mr. Christopherson, who, by the way, continues to send all of his own garbage to Mike out of professional courtesy, and Mike, also out of professional courtesy, considers the great teacher’s contributions at the top of his list of treasures.