Search for cans and real charity is on wheels.
The intent was to ride by two different towns' Memorial Day Parade routes. Best laid plans...
I forgot that the old banners for the side of the hopper still said "March" and not "Man". There was also no reference to the website, so I dug through storage boxes to find some of the scrap banner material to correct the sign. Then I couldn't find a red magic marker. Fact is, I've probably not purchased any magic markers for over 20 years. I usually have found an abundance dumpster diving. My concept of the price of a marker was maybe that they'd be $1.50 if the store was really screwing me. Lo and behold, they don't even sell singular red markers anymore. Finding the standard old style ones (we enjoyed the odor of when were kids) seems impossible. You can buy broad tip Sharpies in two pack of black and red for about $6. You can buy multi-color packs of markers that are made in one of China's cheapest factories for $6, too. They look like they'd dry up or have ink that would fade in the sun. I opted for a small paint brush and some close-out acrylic red paint. Total expense was $3. There is enough to do at least two more banners when I get around to doing new ones on the remaining banner material that I have.
I ended up in Plymouth, Michigan's War Memorial park. I set down there and painted my "Man" corrections while a few people walked by to view monuments and do what Memorial Day is meant for: remember the War dead.
Affixing the corrections to my banners, I rode my bike into the center of town. As I arrived, a young woman in a server uniform hollered that she had some cans for me. She told me to hang on as she went into "Kilwin's Ice Cream". She came out with a trash can that was full of cans and plastic beverage bottles. She said if I came back again, she'd give me more. I thanked her and told her that she was the first. I'd let her know when I got to a million cans. It was a nice start. I'll not haunt their store, but I will go back maybe weekly as I pass through Plymouth.
I went on to Northville. Something Northville and Plymouth have in common are all the "For Lease" signs. Although, that is common in the entire Detroit metro area. It is recent in these two cozy towns.
Nobody came running at me to give me cans in Northville. Still, there simply were not so many people on the street. I went to a grocery return the handful that I'd collected. As I leaned my bike up against the brick to let the cans drop out of the hopper into a shopping cart, a woman driving out of the lot asked if I'd lost my job. With a smile and a wink, I told her I'd lost just about everything (just like so many in America). She reached into her purse and held out $5. I took it and thanked her. She said she had quite a collection of cans at home that she'd give me. She asked how to get in touch with me. I pointed to the banners as I leaned into the car and tried to relate the email address at millioncanman.com. We both agreed that I need to put together some cards since it is such a long address. As we spoke, she pointed behind me as the manager of the store and someone else were first, examining my bike and then heading towards me. She said, "they are coming after you." Surely, she was right. Agressively and impolitely, they asked what I was doing. They apparently guessed that I was soliciting or harassing this woman. She told them in fact that she had asked to talk to me. They backed off and went back inside. I thanked the woman again then went in to cash out my returnables.
As luck would have it, the manager was manning the Service Desk, so I told him that he not only embarassed me, but he offended one of his customers. In fact, I'm one of his customers! In the midst of my moaning about how I think being charitable is good business, he apologized. Before I could put the brakes on my mouth, I said I that the store should consider sponsoring me. He agreed as far as was his ability and wrote down the name and phone number of the folks in their company that do that stuff. I think we parted on good terms. Who knows? Maybe that grocery will be my first sponsor?
The parallel goal of collecting the million cans is to realize real charity as opposed to the levels of greed we've all seen for too long. Day One and I've already seen that it does exist. There is some hope.
