One Mans' Garbage

Last week I bought a new barbeque grill. The old one was not igniting with the switch. It started if you lit it with a match. The grill was 20 years old, so it was time. I called for the sanitation department to come and pick it up, as the regular garbage truck would not take such a large item. I put out the grill a few days before the pick up date, hoping that someone who wanted it would take it first. Within 3 hours, a man pulled up in a beat up truck and carted it away. I do not know if he was planning to use it or get money for scrap metal. Either case was fine. I did not want it. He did. I then remembered what a co worker had told me years ago. She had 2 fairly new bicycles that her daughters had grown too big for. She purchased new bikes for the girls and was going to throw away the old ones that were really in almost new condition. She said that before she put them out in the garbage, she was going to remove the tires and break the frames. I asked her why in the world she would do that. She said that she did not want anyone to have them, since she paid for them. I asked her why she wouldn't just leave them in tact so that maybe a family that could not afford new bikes, could bring them home for their children. She said "who cares about anyone else". What a shame.