I spend many summer nights in the back yard of my Albany home, listening to jazz or a baseball game on the radio. Sometimes, I’m cooking out with either propane or charcoal.

I had been in the market for an all-weather plastic table for one of my gardens. I needed something for my Wayne Shorter and John Coltrane discs, bottles of ketchup, barbecue sauce or Italian dressing and assorted beers.

Didn’t have to shop long. I was out on my bike last Wednesday, garbage night in the neighborhood, and cruised by a scuffed-up, white plastic table someone had kicked to the curb. It was still daylight, and the professional scavengers were not yet out.

I nabbed the table in one hand — it was a double-decker, one four-legged table attached to another — and rode back to my street. I dropped off the free merchandise in my yard and returned to the pedals. Fred Sanford may have been a professional repo man for junk, but there are amateurs in the ranks, too.
The next night, I picked up a bottle of plastic-only white spray paint, and brought this table back to life. There are a few cracks in some of the plastic, but it will be fine for the menial tasks to come. I’m not going to put a set of weights on the thing!

Grabbing one man’s trash doesn’t bother me. I figure I’m saving a hunk of plastic from a landfill, and because I invested $4.99 for spray paint, I’m stimulating the economy. I probably would have spent $15 for a comparable table, so I’m $10 ahead.

I’ve pulled similar rescues in the past. Last fall, a sturdy wooden bar stool was abandoned in my neighborhood. I made the grab, polished it with some Liquid Gold, and covered it with a small tablecloth. It now supports a stained-glass lamp in a corner of my living room; nobody ever sees the “table.”

And a few years ago, I was leaving Rochester after a visit home for Father’s Day. On one street, some dad must have received a new gas grill, because his black kettle for charcoal was ready for the garbage trucks. There was not a thing wrong with this cooker, not a spot of rust. I tossed it in the trunk, bought a new stainless-steel grill and use it whenever I’m in the mood for charcoal.

Another time, old brooms and plastic laundry baskets were hitting the road. They never saw the big trucks; the baskets were hosed and soaped and now they work for me. The brooms sweep out my garage and shed.

I have occasionally cruised by houses where wood trimmed from back yard trees has been cast away. I pop open the trunk and load up; I’ve got a fireplace to feed every winter, and free wood doesn’t grow on trees, if you know what I mean.

I don’t make a habit of grabbing free stuff. The aforementioned professional scavengers, whom I see cruising my street and others with flashlights and pickup trucks, must have garages loaded with junk. How many toasters can a guy use? I expect some of these guys are fixing things up and re-selling them, but that’s still a lot of inventory. I believe there’s a thin line between scavenger and pack rat.

Still, I think it’s good for everyone to recycle. My style of recycling means keeping things out of the landfill ... if only for a few years.