The Transience of Material Being: An Analysis of Lars Eighner’s “On Dumpster Diving”

An analysis of the essay by Lars Eighner, which can be found here: http://producer.csi.edu/cdraney/archive-courses/fall07/engl102/e-texts/eighner-dumpster.htm

    In Lars Eighner’s essay On Dumpster Diving, he recounts a wealth of knowledge and insight gained during a three year period he spent homeless in Austin, Texas with his dog, Lizbeth. He makes use of a unique, casual tone, and presents a usually unseemly topic in a compelling, and often comical light. His essay journeys more into the abstract as the reader follows its pages, but in general he makes the claim that it’s possible to survive, and survive well outside the “housed” community of everyday citizens. Eighner brings a perspective on scavenging for food and goods that differs from the typical knee-jerk reaction to Dumpster diving, and while he doesn’t go so far as to actually advocate sifting through refuse, he presents an interesting account of his experience as a transient.
    There is no more apt idiom for Eighner’s essay than, “One man’s garbage is another man’s gold”. He describes the incredible assortment of things he came across in Dumpsters, including: clothes, boom boxes, bedding, medicine, books, a typewriter, money, drugs, pornography, alcohol, teddy bears, and shredded wedding books. He’s especially found of Dumpsters near affluent college campuses, where he implies that most goods are thrown out more from negligence and ignorance than expiration. Finding mainstays like this, as well as a pizza shop with trustworthy food discarded nightly show how Eighner was a cautious, and sometimes even scrupulous scavenger.
    However, no matter how cautious Eighner was, risk always played a part in his day to day scavenging. He speaks of how even something as seemingly safe as a tin can still holds the possibility to breed botulism. Dysentery, he says, occurred at least monthly due to the kinds of food he was gated into eating. There was also an instance on a hot day where he discovered a cold jug of Hurricane mix, and wasn’t aware of its high alcohol content until after gulping down a few glasses. And while perhaps comical in retrospect, he lets us know that, “Some divers would have considered this a boon, but being suddenly and thoroughly intoxicated in a public place in the early afternoon is not my idea of a good time(5)”. But for all the risks associated with Dumpster diving, Eighner worried most about the fire ants.
    He shows us a brilliant bit of ingenuity when describing how his dog, Lizbeth, acted as an early alert system for the aggressive insects, letting him know when it was time to leave by performing her “Dance of the Zillion Fire Ants.”
    In these kinds of passages, Eighner appeals to his audience in a gentle, yet tactile way. We who read over this essay have inherent value systems in place that will most likely cause us to feel uncomfortable and even disgusted by much of what Eighner describes. But he is aware of this risk of alienating the reader, and so presents much of what he writes in an upbeat, light hearted tone that acts as a subtle wink to the invisible boundaries of our society. He even goes so far as to guide the reader in understanding how a normal housed person can come to think like a scavenger.
    “At first”, he says, “the new scavenger is filled with disgust and self loathing. . . He cannot erase the stigma of eating garbage out of his mind.(6)” This passes as the scavenger becomes more experienced, he says, and begins to understand that people throw away multitudes of useable items.
    A unique set of what Eighner calls, “scavenger ethics(8)” begin to develop, at least for him, after time spent growing used to the lifestyle of Dumpster diving. He begins to advocate keeping only what he needs, or at least collecting just one kind of item at a time. And while he has little problem probing through rotting food for an edible portion, he despises “can scroungers”. Usually drug addicts or winos looking for fast money to feed their habits, Eighner disdains these meddlesome rooters and their lack of respect for their fellow scavenging brothers, as they often leave Dumpster areas littered and mixed, resulting in contaminated food and other items. “They can see only cans”, he says, while “A true scavenger hates to see good stuff go to waste, and what he cannot use he leaves in good condition in plain sight(8)”.
    Eighner takes two lessons away from his Dumpster diving days. The first is to only take what he can use, and discard the rest. “I was shocked to realize that some things are not worth acquiring, but now I think it is so(11)”. And the second, perhaps more profound lesson is what he calls the transience of material being. It’s through the loss of having material items, or at least having them as a constant, that Eighner comes realize the importance of good ideas, and how their life will outlast anything tangibly produced.
    But what’s most interesting at the end of the essay is Eighner comparing himself to the upper class, after having his fill of material gain: “We both know there is plenty more where what we have came from(11)”. He goes on to pity the “rat race millions who have confounded their selves with the objects they grasp and who nightly scavenge the cable channels looking for they know what not(12)”. He doesn’t seem intent on manipulating the audience away from their own materialistic lifestyles, but rather instills a quiet revelation in the reader: That all we have and seek in the realm of materialism is fleeting, and that the sentiments we imbue into these inanimate objects are what really count--not the objects themselves.
    Eighner’s essay is an amusing study in the covetous nature inherent in so many Americans. He speaks to his audience as a master might a pupil; one who’s wisdom transcends the boundaries of current perspective to enlighten. He wastes no time moving us away from preconceived notions about the homeless, and instead of sticking to dreary stereotypes, he illuminates the adventures and laughter that he discovered living along the edges of civilized society. By the end of his essay, we no longer see him as a bum or starving hobo, but instead as a purveyor of time we’re not yet ready for-- when all that we value will be impossible to price.