On the beaten path

By ANDREA VanVALKENBURG
Staff Writer

As falls approaches, I can’t wait to spend another season in the Adirondacks, surrounded by the breathtaking landscape and rustic charm of the changing foliage.

But there’s one thing that always bothers me as I take in the pristine views: disgusting garbage and trash littering almost every roadway.

Almost every day I drive, I’m amazed at the papers, diapers, McDonalds bags and even full bags of trash that tarnish what should be an unblemished view.

I love even more getting stuck behind the many drivers who toss their garbage out of the window or opt to not cover their truck load of garbage.

One time in particular, I recall having to crawl underneath my car to tear off a plastic bag that got caught after I spent about 10 miles trying to dodge the free-falling garbage that flew off the back of a truck.

My irritation with the garage problem grew greatly a few months ago when several area residents actually wrote Letters to the Editor complaining about local sheriff’s deputies issuing citations for these very offenses.

Seriously???

Why should towns and counties have to foot the bill and waste manpower cleaning up the roadways when people were simply to lazy to cover their rotting garbage?

Why should other people have to spend their days picking up the scraps of paper and junk that people were too lazy to put in the garbage?

I must admit rolling down a window and moving an arm to throw something is much easier than walking five steps to the nearest garbage. Maybe, instead of fining our lazy neighbors, they could be made to clean it themselves.

Better yet, maybe the county can bring its many bags of highway treasures to the driver’s home and decorate their lawn.

Maybe then they’ll learn the meaning of a garbage can.

But then again, garbage isn’t meant to go on their lawns — just everyone else’s, apparently.

Posted by Lois Clermont at 9:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

By LOIS CLERMONT
News Editor

I winced when I saw “The Old Man and the Sea” on a Plattsburgh High School reading list for kids entering ninth grade.

I think that book has been turning young people off from Ernest Hemingway for years.

It’s not that it’s not a good book; it won a Pulitzer Prize.

It’s just a lousy way to introduce teenagers to a wonderful writer.

When Hemingway came on the scene, his writing was refreshingly different from the formal, more stilted style that had been popular for decades. He wrote like a journalist — a conversational style, spare sentences where every word mattered, dialogue that developed the characters and the mood.

Teenagers would appreciate the love stories, the crisp dialogue, the sad circumstances portrayed in “The Sun Also Rises” and “For Whom the Bell Tolls.”

But they won’t want to wade through the long descriptive passages about a man’s struggle to catch a fish in “The Old Man and the Sea.” Yes, it’s about way more than that, and it’s a great book for discussion among college students. But it’s downright dull for 13- and 14-year-olds. They will forever after remember Hemingway as that boring guy who writes about fishing.

Hemingway himself was surprised when “The Old Man and the Sea” won a Pulitzer; it hadn’t been one of his favorites, although he quickly embraced the attention. The award was given more for his body of work than for that particular novel.

I think one of the big draws in picking that novel for a reading list is that it’s Hemingway’s shortest book. Maybe teachers figure they have a chance to get the kids to read a classic novel by an acclaimed author if it’s just 127 pages.

But length isn’t everything. Think about the thousands of local kids — and adults — who are eagerly gobbling up every word of the 759-page “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.”

It’s interesting that that book — the most widely anticipated book release of the summer, one that was sure to be a hit with young people, a book that features a classic battle of good versus evil amid imaginative characters and an engrossing plot — isn’t on any school reading list I’ve seen.

Posted by Lois Clermont at 1:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)