Dumpster Diving:  This story will go down as one of my more famous dumpster diving experiences. I’m embarrassed to say I’ve had a few such experiences in my repertoire!  This dumpster dive story happened last weekend.
 
It was Sunday afternoon.  Our family decided to forego the usual Sunday family dinner because of the ice and weather.  It definitely wasn’t a great day to travel.  So we all decided to stay home.  With an unplanned free afternoon and evening, I decided I would continue on a project I’ve been working on for over year.  That project is to digitize all of our old family films and videos.  While many projects sit on my list for some time, digitizing all of our old 8 & 16mm film reels and video tapes is a huge undertaking so this project would span a couple of years.  Last year, I decided to expand the project to include all of our family’s old video and film!  My great Uncle Ralph, my mom’s uncle, was famous for filming family events with his 16mm camera.  He had reels and reels of film dating back to the early 50s.  One I already digitized was footage of my parent’s wedding in 1962.  I was amazed with the quality and condition of the 16mm film.  The digitized video files were like HD video.  While the 8mm films are a tad bit grainy when digitized, the 16mm ones render some awesome video files.  When my Uncle Ralph and Aunt Barbara’s house was sold, we salvaged as much of the 16mm reels as we could.  I got a huge storage tub of reels that I was to sort through and figure out which would make it on the list to get digitized.  Given the free time now standing before me last Sunday, I decided it was time to sort through the reels.
 
As I was sorting through the tub of film reels, I saw reels that included events like my cousin Raymond’s birthday or his baptism.  I also saw footage of their family trips.  I decided to make two piles: one for reels to be digitized and another for reels that would get tossed and the metal canisters put in the recycling bin.  Since my Uncle Ralph’s side of the family didn’t really want the reels and had no use for them, I figured I could narrow down what I would keep or not keep simply by make a determination based on the content of the reel; my Uncle diligently labeled each reel of film.  If a reel had something to do with our side of the family it would be kept; everything else was put in the pile to be tossed.  After the sorting was done, I double checked the indexes and labels just to make sure I wasn’t throwing out anything of great value for our family video project.  My Uncle was also famous for filming things like the Rose Bowl on TV or even the Hudson’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.  All of those reels were put in the “to be tossed” pile.  After the sorting and rechecking was done, I put on my coat and stood in the freezing rain and separated the canisters and recycled what I could before tossing the reels of film in the garbage.  Once I tidied up the mess, I had a great sense of accomplishment because a project moved along on the list and I was able to toss a bunch of stuff.  I then grabbed something to munch on and waited a few minutes before calling my parents at 9:30 p.m.  I often don’t get that “I’ve accomplished something today” feeling but this day was one of them!  I was riding high!
 
At 9:30 p.m. I called my parents.  Usually my dad answers and we talk first but this time both of my parents picked up the phone at the same time.  So we chatted about the day.  As I was telling them about my great accomplishments and how I sorted through the films and tossed a bunch of the reels because I didn’t think they were relevant or “useful” for our video project, there was a gasp and some silence from my mom.  I suddenly heard this voice inside me shout, “AH OH, you’re in trouble big time.  I don’t know what you just did but you’ve done good!”  “What’s wrong,” I asked.  My mom said, “But I would have been at that birthday party.  Grandma and Grandpa would have been at that baptism.  I was on that trip to Pennsylvania.”  Suddenly my big balloon was popped.  I never gave it a nanosecond of thought that members of our family would have been at the birthday party or baptism.  What was I thinking?  I rolled my eyes and shook my head.  Suddenly, I realized my evening was going to get complicated because I had no choice but to recover those film reels before the garbage was picked up in the morning.  There was no way now they would suffer the dreadful fate of filling a landfill.  I couldn’t wait to get off the phone.
 
As soon as I hung up, I put my winter jacket back on and made a beeline right to the garbage bins.  It was sleeting and pouring rain at this point.  My first attempt to retrieve the film reels was unsuccessful because they were buried in the bin.  After pulling out the small amount of trash I had in the bin, I moved the bin into the garage so I could grab the reels without getting them wet.  I noted immediately that the film had become very brittle and was starting to crack in the cold as I handled it.  Ugh!  This project was going downhill quickly.  At one point I couldn’t reach the bottom of the bin so I tipped it slightly and had my head and half my body stuck inside so I could grab the remaining reels at the very bottom.  As I was fully occupied in my dumpster dive experience, I noted a white SUV pause in front of my house as it was going down Overlake.  “Oh great,” I thought to myself, “it’s bad enough that I’m dumpster diving but even worse that someone actually caught me!”  I could only imagine what it looked like seeing a 6 foot 7 inch winter coat cladded person with half of his body bent over and in the garbage bin in the pouring freezing rain!  But by golly, I saved those film reels!  I can’t wait to see what’s on them.
 
Festival Raffle Tickets:  Thank you to the 547 families who turned in their Festival Raffle Tickets thus far.  When I glanced at the list, I was amazed at the record setting return for the early bird drawing.  When I saw the indexed list numbering 547 names, I was grateful and amazed.  Festival Raffle Ticket returns form a significant part of our festival income.  So far, we’ve brought in just shy of $38,000 in raffle ticket monies!  We’re off to a great start.  THANK YOU!  And, keep those prayers going.  We now have 26 days until the end of winter … I mean the start of the Festival!
 
Enjoy the week.  Know of my prayers.
 
In Christ,
 
gmb
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