These Items Take Littering to a Whole New Level

Littering is wrong, bad, never appropriate. Can we all agree on that?

Common litter items like empty bags of chips, paper plates from a drunken slice of late-night pizza, and empty beer or soda cans infuriate me, but I expect them at this point after a weekend night in the city.

However, some items take littering to a whole new level, the likes of which no one should ever encounter.

Sunday morning, felt like any other morning. My dogs and I strolled around our little area of South Philly. I kept an eye out for the usual hazards: broken glass, chicken bones, vomit from a night of boozing.

My oldest dog, currently with a voracious appetite due to the steroids he’s on, pulled hard to the right. I saw it out of the corner of my eye. It was large and white. The initial shape didn’t immediately register in my index of potential street hazards. As he pulled closer to the unidentified object, it became clear what it was. It was this.

A freshly used and discarded napkin rested nicely among the cracked nutshells from the squirrels in the trees above. A feminine napkin to be precise. A used maxi pad, or pad, as the women in my life have routinely called them.

I lived with my mother and sister growing up. I’ve been with a female partner for the majority of my years of this earth. My partner and I have traveled the world. We’ve been stuck atop a mountain in Hawaii at 9,000 feet above sea level with a car that ran out of gas. I’ve done road trips from Philly to Fort Lauderdale with a car of mostly women. In all of those years, experiences, and adventures, I’ve never encountered a moment where a woman had the need to rip out a pad from her underwear and toss it into onto the street, sidewalk, beach, ocean, or fields.

I don’t know what the situation was and, honestly, I never want to find out. I’m sure whoever discarded the pad had a legit reason from removing it from their underwear. I simply don’t understand tossing onto a heavily traveled city street, especially with a trash can less than ten feet away.

The fun didn’t end there. About a hundred yards away, I gave my youngest dog a quick and gentle push to the right with my leg as I saw his paw about to make a direct hit on this item in the street.

The puzzle started coming together. Either two people had a wild night independent of one another or a woman was menstruating, became exceptionally randy, found a willing partner, ripped out her pad, and proceeded to engage in some sort of safe sex, and one of them, apparently, had toilet paper handy to clean up. All of which, the pad, the condom, and the toilet paper were strewn haphazardly onto the public street for all passersby to see and/or step upon.

Let’s stress the positive here. People engaged in safe sex. That should always be encouraged.

With that being said, how the fuck does one go about tossing used maxi pads, used condoms, and a toilet paper jizz-rag out onto the street like it’s a bag of chips? COME ON, PEOPLE! There are trashcans at both ends of this block, too.

Here’s a suggestion for those who find themselves uncontrollably horny in public places or find themselves routinely discarding their maxi pads in public. Buy yourself a roll of biodegradable dog poop bags and keep them handy. Hell, you can get 540 of them for $15 if you’re the super horny type. You never know when you’ll need a trash bag for your biohazard litter. At least bag it up before tossing it onto the street.

This world we live upon is home to billions of people. A little consideration for those around us goes a long way. Nobody wants to step on your used maxi pad or condom and bring your bodily fluids into their homes—this includes spit.

Trash pick-up may be delayed a day or two and the city has its pungent moments in the summer head, but the city is not a public trashcan.  We can do better, Philly.