Noose Paper

I wasn't trying to make trouble: I just wanted to throw stuff away. Which in New York is just slightly harder than becoming the next Mrs. Donald Trump.

I'll confess right off the bat, I've never understood the recycling flyers. They turn up every so often in my mail, creating their own little stack of waste newsprint. They're decorated with caricatures of trash cans with wide eyes and flashy lipstick that made me think SpongeBob SquarePants fans are their target audience, and the rules are so odd I think whoever wrote them must surely have been nipping at the Nyquil. They said we should recycle "glass bottles and jars," but not "any other types of glass." A bottle isn't a "type" of glass, but a shape. What if I had, say, a carafe of glass? A flagon? A vial, a flask, a decanter? Why are just bottles and jars deemed worthy? Similarly with "plastic bottles and jugs." How about a jar, a canteen, a beaker? Do we ignore the little recycling triangles embossed into plastic tubs and blithely fling them into the trash?

The rules for paper are just as capricious. Corrugated cardboard boxes can be tied into bundles, they said, but there's no such instruction for newspapers or magazines. They should be thrown haphazardly into a clear bag or a green bin, apparently. Not bundled, not tied, and certainly not stuffed into a yellow bag, or a purple bin. In fact, you know all those blue bags people use for recycling? According to the flyers, they're wrong.

Oh, and while trying to memorize all the details, remember that with one tiny misstep you'll get socked with a pricey ticket. Like everybody in my building, and now me.

It all started when I ran out of twine. I'd been tying up my newspapers and magazines for years, and figured doing away with it could be a good thing. Trader Joe's packed my groceries in doubled, heavy-duty paper bags, so I figured they'd be perfect for paper castoffs. They were strong, with reinforced paper handles, and totally recyclable. How sensible it all seemed . . . for such a short time.

On recycling morning I left them out at the curb, and an hour later the building's owner rang me. ""Did you try to throw away paper bags full of paper?" Edna screamed, like I'd passed out Ex-Lax to Trick-or-Treaters. "What on earth have you been smoking?"

I calmed her down with talk of the Yankees and the weather and paying rent by wire transfer, and slowly pieced together the details. The Recycling Men had not only refused to pick up my bags, but they'd attached a ticket to one. It was my trash so it was my ticket, Edna declared, and I agreed to take care of it.

The ticket looked like it'd been scrawled by an illiterate chicken, but I could faintly make out "loose newspaper in paper bags," and the $25 fine. There were so many errors and omissions it should have been tossed out just on technicalities. But my primary thought was: You can't recycle paper in recyclable paper bags?

I called the number listed for further details, and after ringing four or five times a bored man answered. "I'd think that'd be okay," he answered to my question. "But the rule is, dispose of paper in a clear or green plastic bag. Or tie it up with twine."

Interesting, I thought. Green bag, twine. Two methods not mentioned in the rules. "Is that what you do?" I asked.

"Hell no," he said. "I just toss mine out with the trash."

I emailed friends in various parts of the country, just for a sanity check. One blanched at the idea of Trash Police, but he was from New Hampshire. It's all "Live Free Or Die" there. The rest were unanimous: "That's ridiculous," they said. "You should be able to recycle paper in a paper bag. It's paper!"

And so, determined to bring logic to city government, I decided to fight. The ticket listed a hearing date a month away, and I pictured myself confronting the ticket writer. I'd bring in both bags and have them admitted as evidence, cool as Perry Mason, and after I showed how patently absurd it all was, the crowd would leap to its feet and cheer. The case would be laughed out of court.

Wait, I thought. I can't bring in the bags. I had errands to run afterwards; how would I get rid of them? The city has inspectors who do nothing but rifle through public trash cans to ensure that nobody's mixed in their household trash. Dumping these things would probably bring out the SWAT team.

Instead I snapped a photo and brought it into the Environmental Control Office, a dirty little maze with demanding signs covering every square inch of wall. No smoking, no eating, no drinking, no admittance, no standing in this area, no cash, no credit cards. Three photocopied pages declaring "RING BELL ONCE AND RELEASE IMMEDIATELY" were taped around one barred window.

After a forty-five minute wait I was led into a room just big enough for two. Keith was my "administrative law judge," though he had the middle-aged, almost-attractive look of a guy who'd date your sister. He flipped through the papers in his folder at a table so tiny the breeze fluffed my hair. "So you're representing Rocco?" he asked.

"Who?" I asked, with the candor of a man who had nothing to hide.

"The Sanitation Department paperwork lists Rocco as the owner, so if you aren't authorized by Rocco, you can't represent him."

Time stood still while I pondered. I could say, "Oh. That's too bad," virtually ensuring I'd be standing in sunlight within twelve seconds. Or I could say, "Oh, ROCCO. I thought you said PACO. Yeah, Rocco says I can speak for him." And I'd get a shot at defending myself.

Being a lousy liar, I went with the former. Since I didn't know Rocco, I didn't get a hearing.

When Edna purchased the place, Keith explained, she'd neglected to send a notarized copy of the deed to the Sanitation Department to update their records. Like a New Yorker has ever been that bored. But the situation wasn't totally hopeless, he said. If I dragged Edna in, or if I brought in a notarized copy of the deed and eight independent witnesses, or a swarthy waiter named Tatsuo, a souvenir from the Titanic, and a hamster that knew Jiu Jitsu, I could have a hearing.

Until then, I couldn't defend my trash in court.

I waited for Keith to laugh and tell me I'd been Punk'd, but he didn't. Somehow he kept a straight face, like it was actually possible to convince a landlord that Garbage Court would be a great way to spend an afternoon. Mine wouldn't fall for it. In fact, Edna and I had nearly exchanged gunfire over a letter marked "OCCUPANT."

"Level with me," I said. "If I brought in the old owner and the new owner and both of their lawyers and two independent witnesses and a dog that barked 'I love you,' would I win?"

He looked at my photo and then glared at me, like I'd offered him a hit off my bong. "Nope. You can't recycle paper in a brown paper bag."

I wrote out a check for the fine, my self-esteem dwindling with my bank balance. So much for bringing sense or reason to government. In fact, it'd take major alcohol to make me forget this travesty.

Drunk from a ewer, or a flagon, or an urn.