Backyard Garbage Cleanup

It all started with my New Year's tree, remember? I bought and decorated a live tree with the intention of planting it here in Tbilisi so that there's something tangible left after me here.

This is the tree, fully decorated and lit up for the holiday season:

It was standing like this for a long time, until one day (February 19) I woke up in the morning and saw the new green springing out on it. I immediately removed the decorations so that the tree could grow unconstrained.

I couldn't plant it into the ground because it was too cold. Not for the tree, of course, but for me. Digging in the cold soil was not my idea of fun.

Last week the spring finally arrived. It was warm and sunny, but then one freakishly cold day screwed up my intent to plant the tree again. Finally, for the last two days we had both sun and rain, the soil should have been soft and I finally decided today, Sunday, was the day to do it.

Especially because the tree started to shed its needles on some branches. I don't know if it got sick or it's the regular spring phenomenon but today I finally took the tree out for planting into the ground.

There's a long and narrow backyard between my apartment complex and a row of smaller private houses that I'd been eyeing for a long time as a spot for the tree. It has a lot of sun during the day for most of the day and I am surprised that no one has thought about growing a garden there as it has so much sun.

But when I took the tree out and started to probe the soil I realized why: it was most likely the site where the construction workers dumped a lot of debris while building the apartment complex and when they were done they just put a thin layer of soil on top of it.

It took me five or six attempts to find a spot that didn't have too many rocks, pieces of plastic and steel pipes, and bricks buried in it. I was able to dig out a hole with my little garden trowel deep enough to plant the tree. Here's how it looks in the ground, bare branches and all:

Now it will have to do its own work of breaking around the stones and rocks with its roots. If it gains strength and takes root, of course. I'm going to check on it every day. Good thing we are supposed to have a couple of rainy days so I won't have to water it as much.

Anyway, after I planted the tree I decided to clean up around it. The thing is that this backyard has not been cleaned for years, and there was a lot of glass and plastic bottles and caps, all sorts of garbage such as snack rappers, cigarette butts and packages, plastic bags, dog poop bags, and even kid diapers. I thought my little tree deserved a better environment.

I wish I had taken a picture of how bad it looked but I didn't take my phone with me when I left at 11 am for tree planting. So at about noon, after I planted the tree and cleaned out the space around it, I went back to my apartment and brought my phone.

I also discovered that the large tree next to the backyard staircase is a fig, with the fruit already coming out, but still no leaves.

And then I continued cleaning up. Someone discarded a large plastic mattress cover there so I've used it to pile up the garbage. I also put the recyclable plastic and glass bottles into the broken garden pot someone threw away.

Tbilisi residents dry their clothes on the clothes lines in their balconies and if the gust of wind takes something off you can never find it. A lot of this stuff ended up in the backyard. I have separated the clothes that can be washed and put them into the red plastic bag. It was mostly kid clothes, so I'll wash and donate them to Humana, which is a thrift store chain here in Tbilisi. I made a little pile of what I thought still could be usable:

As I was moving around the back yard collecting garbage, some of my neighbors came out to their balconies to watch me. Some gave me thumps up when I waved at them. No one came down to help, though. Perhaps because they thought it was my job, like the municipality sent me to do this. And today is Sunday, who wants to do hard labor on Sunday?

This is how much garbage I collected. The white plastic bag has the fabric in it - clothes, towels and socks that were beyond cleaning and repair.

I worked till 2 pm, and got tired and hungry. So I took the garbage to the dumpster and decided it was enough for one day. There are still patches to clean out there, around the corners, but that will be a job for another weekend. This is how the backyard looks now from the other end, where my tree now is. I feel pretty good about it now.

I've also found some small treasures: a couple of good clothes hangers and clothespins, several tetri coins, and a black storage crate that I can keep my gardening stuff in on the balcony. Overall, not bad, even though now my arms and legs are aching.