In Memory of Calvin Purvis

The galvanized trash can had to be picked up and carried to the curb if    you didn't want it to leave a chalky scar scraped snakewisedown the driveway. The other men on the crew came and went, but Calvin    Purvis held fast to the back of the garbage truckyear after year, lifting his gloved hand in salute to the neighborhood kids    on ten-speeds and coaster bikes calling out,"Hey Cal-vin!" in bright voices. We loved the hauler of our trash and    needed him to have a name. Even with twice-a-week pickup

it was a one-garbage-truck town. Nobody'd heard of recycling. We didn't    think much about trash except as a wordto throw around, useful to describe reading material that wasn't approved    of, or people: any man sitting on a porch stoopduring business hours—if you could push a broom, why weren't you    working a job?—or the brassy girls who showed up latefor high school, always a hickey on their neck, then disappeared with    every intention of earning a diploma once the baby was born.

After a day on the truck, Calvin could be found at the city park, watching    his nephew play shortstop. With a hint of a stammerhe'd yell, "Thow your high ball, kid!" no matter who was on the mound.    He wouldn't sit in the bleachers and never let onif he was surprised by what we'd decided to toss away. Who were we to    complain if he wasn't particularly gentle with the trash cansthat rusted out before we got around to replacing them? They always came    back empty enough and upright on the curb.

Now he's gone. We will all of us one day be as absent as the fast girls from    first-period history class, unmissed as the discardsat the city dump, where teenagers park in winter, the dashboard light so    low it's hard to judge the crest of need in their lover's eye.