November 18th 2015

Jonah Lomu died today. Forty years of age and one of the best known sports names in history. The rugby pundits will write reams and reams about the great man and I will ponder further on the mortality issue once again. Despite his enormous achievements like all other passers-by he will soon be forgotten. The next time we will read of the great Jonah will be the annual obituaries in the Christmas to New Year period when we will be reminded of those who had graduations of the soul in 2015.

To be acclaimed in your own lifetime is of some questionable value; to be remembered with affection after you have left the stage is of no consequence to the principal. The point is often made in posthumous comment about the tragic waste of one so young. When you are in the happy hunting ground the concept of waste is totally inconsequential. The real waste in the world happens during ones existence!

Do we ever stop to think about what we really waste that might make a difference to our fellow man while we still are in a position to better someone’s lot? Much has been written about the unforgivable waste of resources for which we are responsible. Some of the hard facts about waste are incredible.

When we were little and with worldly goods much less endowed than we are now my mother had a rule about waste. It was very simply; eat your crust! The crust represented about one tenth of the loaf of bread so if you didn’t eat it then you were wasting that proportion of your food in that format. In that era waste was considered a sin and that mortal mistake has assumed epic proportions in today’s existence.

In 1845 at the defined start of the Famine people would eat anything that a starved stomach would accept. Plain people perished in their hundreds of thousands. In modern Ireland it is calculated that one third of all food purchased in this country is wasted or thrown away. Unbelievable, but true. In the almighty United States of America this figure reaches half of all food purchased. I put the blame in great measure on the supermarket moguls.

As one who regularly examines in forensic detail the contents of fly tipping and illegal dumping I can say with certainty that the contents of discarded black bags amaze me. Meat and vegetables, canned foods of all eatables, fruit, cereals, baby foods and medicines are dumped in huge volumes by gobshites who refuse to pay for disposal of their refuse in the manner prescribed by the law of the land. These persons are invariably of the mobile fraternity or Irish non-nationals.