I have been reluctant to share today’s ditty for a variety of reasons, many of which I ignore because it’s not in my nature to follow instructions. I think this may be the result of being over instructed in my youth. That’s just a guess, but we'll go with that for the time being.

So, in the summers, I help my wife look after some rental properties. You know, the usual, clean up between guests, vacuum, change the beds, dispose of the trash etc. One of the small benefits we realize is that we can gather empty bottles and cans for redemption. We use the money to help pay for stuff like our annual family gathering on Monhegan. It’s not huge money but it’s not insignificant. The only down side is that we sometimes “store” some pretty funky empties in our car trunks as we collect. Like the bag I had after one of our “guests” had a massive drunken bash—- lots of empties in a bag of bottles that smelled like 2 a.m. at the Thistle, 30 years ago! Not sure the trunk of my car will ever recover.

At the same time we were cottage cleaners, two of our good friends passed, Dominic Garvey and Danilo Konvalinka. Neither of them had any resources so we arranged for cremation services in Belfast. I drew short straw and gathered myself to retrieve Dominic and pick up Danilo in Waldoboro at a friend's house. All this in a rush to get back to the town to help with another project. I labeled their boxes so as not to mix them up (who would know) and put them in the car trunk on top of my bag of empties.

Leaving Waldoboro on old Business Route One, I came to the intersection with new Route One and a stop sign which I glided through in advance of a car I could see heading south but far enough away, if I hurried, to clear. I dropped the old Jetta into second gear and punched it out onto Route One. About half a mile down the road I saw blue lights in the rear view mirror and pulled over hoping this wasn’t about me. Sorry Charlie.

The officer was polite and requested the usual license, registration and insurance cards. With the window down I could see his nose twitch a bit. “Have you been drinking sir?” he asked. “No sir” I said, slightly on edge. “Could you please step out of the car and open the trunk?”

The smell almost knocked us over. “Returnables” I said. “And what’s in the boxes?” the officer inquired.