Melissa Goodnight

We spent NYE at my husband’s office helping him reorganize after a minor renovation. His primary office is in a small building on one of his company’s landfills.

This particular landfill is quite large with an open working face (where the trash is actively dumped) as well as several filled cells, sediment ponds, an energy plant powered from gas released under foot, and a waste-water removal/purification system. It’s a complicated heap of things (literally and figuratively) that I don’t consider when I roll my bins to the street each week. But it’s increasingly a heap I need to consider.

Also worth considering: the family of deer that graze on the land.

As the sun was setting, Jerimiah drove us to the top of the working face. From there we were able to see at least 40 miles in all directions. The Atlanta Skyline was visible through the blazing orange and pink, as was Stone Mountain, and the Blue Ridge Mountains to the north.

We talked about a lot of things up there. We talked about the new year, about life, work, school. We discussed possibility and kindness. Fear and failure. We talked about the toxicity of it all, and about underground gasses so hot that an eternal flame they call “The Candlestick” must glow bright all hours of the day. Or else.

We also talked about the deer. About how they’ve adapted to their environment. How large trucks and heavy machinery don’t bother them, but the moment I stepped silently onto the deck, they were startled, hackled, suspicious. As if they knew, instinctively, from which the real danger emanates.

Still, they come to pasture day in and day out. After all, this is their home. It has been for centuries before the landfill came and it will be for centuries after. If they are so lucky. If we are all so lucky.

I suppose for all the wild and wonderful ways our year could have ended, this one was pretty good. It sparked inside of us careful consideration for nature, industry, and the intersection of the two. It gave us a new perspective and a brief moment to dwell in possibility as we imagined a better way for our world and for ourselves.

I’m wishing you all that and more for the coming year. ❤️