Divine Rituals of the Suburbs

Over the years I've made no secret of the fact that I feel living in the suburbs is a disappointing letdown from city life. In fact, it's a dead horse I've beaten to such a tedious degree that I'm surprised the Mayor hasn't already relegated me to an efficiency apartment somewhere in downtown Jersey City just to shut me up. I'll have to keep beating.

Some day, I'll blog about everything I dislike about suburbia, but today I am singing its praises. For we are in the midst of suburbia's high holy days--truly spiritual days of searching the dark recesses, purging and purifying and hopefully by the end of it feeling deeply cleansed and reborn. On Saturday we paid homage as a town to Our Lady of the Immaculate Garage. We asked ourselves the hard questions, "Will Nana hate me from heaven for getting rid of her old toaster oven? Surely there's no chance of me being 'blessed' with another baby, is there?  And isn't it some kind of sin for a family of four that's down to three in the house to own and store eight bicycles?" Days we spent in preparation--sorting, cleaning, carting and pricing our meager, dust-covered offerings and laying them on the sacrificial tables of the Borough-wide Garage Sale. Pilgrims from all over town and the towns nearby filed solemnly by street by street, yard by yard, offering alms for the once sacred symbols and now sad relics of our devoted consumerism. It was an exhausting, yet gloriously gratifying event. Nary a soul came away from the day without feeling a great weight lifted from them. And yet, it was just the beginning, a mere precursor to the main holiday that will occur on Thursday.

I refer, of course, to The Feast of St. Bulk--the bulk trash pick-up extravaganza we look forward to every year at least as much as, if not more than Thanksgiving. In fact, and excuse me for being somewhat irreverent, but we probably ought to subtitle it, ThanksTaking. With the powers that be smiling down upon us, we can divest ourselves of everything we do not want any longer. Big things, small things, ugly raunchy things that we cannot believe still exist in the temples of our daily life can be placed on the side of the road and will miraculously ascend into the belly of a giant beast that takes them away forever. Friends and relatives from other towns must beat back the dual temptations of envy and the desire to lay their junk at our curb. One must keep them strong in their resistance, for it is wrong for them to covet their neighbor's Bulk Day and illegal for them to participate. The Feast of St. Bulk attracts its own pilgrims, too, but it's a leaner, meaner crowd. They come on a mission with their trucks and vans, leaving their loved ones at home, to forage for the holy grail of garbage.

All in all, it's an exhausting week of service and sacrifice. In the end, one always asks oneself, "Could I have done more, contributed more, worked harder or turned away from more earthly possessions?" Occasionally, there are regrets and recriminations--"how could you have thrown away that fish tank I've owned since I was ten? What kind of heartless daughter of Satan tosses a box of well worn, once loved stuffed animals?" But within a few days, a feeling of calm and contentment takes over as we forget not only that we gave things up, but that we ever owned them in the first place. We walk into our attics and garages without tripping and begin thinking of all kinds of new crap we can buy to fill up all that space. Ah, Suburbia!