Almanac Music: Musical musings from a garbage truck

 

The boss was mad when I did a garbage run. Years before,  I moved to the city to be with a fashion designer. He did everything he could to break your back. 5 hour loads of running, lifting, as fast and hard as you could. 20 minutes to suck in air while he unloaded, then go again for 5 more.

 

His favourite method of sacking was to simply not slow down when a bloke couldn’t keep up.

 

But, somehow, some why, he had two tinny speakers over the back tray, which, from the cabin, he’d channel surf.

 

My taste was too raw, most all of the songs were just white noise, yet somehow helped anyway.

 

Mondays I’d do a triple. 15 hours of flat out running and lifting. 5.30am start, by the last stint, I would be the only one on the tray, working both side of the road, in rhythm of exhausted physical invincibility, through a cul-de-sac maze of old people’s homes, until about 9pm.

 

Last of the garage in, I’d tilt the compactor and lie in the scoop, spent, while the boss played the whole of a jazz show on independent radio.

 

Every week.

 

I’d just lie in a heap, in the scoop, watching streetlights, power lines passing, feeling every bend as we uncurled onto bigger roads, how smooth they were without traffic, listening to tune after tune, so magnanimous, so soothing. Know what the American working class of the ‘30s and ‘40s knew, about something that rode with pain, making it okay. Making it timeless.

 

If I heard the same songs now, I’d probably shrug, but those Monday nights contained the most exquisite music to ever touch a soul.

 

It knew something.

 

 

More from Matt Zurbo Here.

 

 

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