What's the story behind the poop-filled small plastic bags left beside the DeLaveaga Park hiking trails? I understand the beginning & middle: a hiker takes her dog for a walk, & when the dog poops, she gathers the poop into a small plastic bag she’s brought along for just this purpose. But how to explain the ending? Instead of taking the bag back out & dropping it a trash barrel, she leaves the poop-filled bag beside the trail.
My granddaughter & I often try to figure out stories to explain peculiar circumstances. For example, the missing piece of fence along Branciforte Road probably means a car drove through it, but why did the car drive through? Maybe the driver was driving too fast. Maybe the driver swerved to avoid a person or an animal. Maybe a blown tire caused the driver to lose control of the car. “Or maybe the driver was careless,” my granddaughter says. Or drugged or drunk, I tell myself. Maybe we’re wrong about the beginning of the story. Maybe a gust of wind blew the fence down.
I can only think of disappointing endings to the poop-bags-beside-the-trail story. Maybe the person set the poop bag down so she didn’t have to carry it for the whole hike, & then on her way back she forgot to pick it up. Or maybe she hiked a different trail back & forgot she’d left behind a poop bag on the first one. Still, leaving a bag of poop on a hiking trail seems a poor decision, especially four bags of poop in one mile.
Part of me wanted to pick up the poop bags & carry them out to a trash barrel. Part of me decided to leave them because they were dirty & I had no gloves. Part of me wants to hide beside the trail next time & wait for a person to set down a poop bag & walk away. All of me wonders what would happen next.
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