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Every Tuesday morning for a couple of years, I have enjoyed the special moment when the city recycling truck passes by. The truck stops, I hear the crash of glass dumped into the truck, then a voice signaling to the driver, “Yo!” and the truck moves a few yards onward. Then pickup, crash, “Yo!” and, perhaps, the pickup man jumping onto the running board as the truck lurches onward before he jumps off again. 

The shout reminded me of my San Francisco Mission District childhood, when the old junkman came up York Street (in a horse-drawn wagon) hoarsely shouting, “Rags, bottles, sacks,” and of the the cries of street peddlers that Gershwin wrote into “Porgy and Bess.” In Berkeley, we have our own street cries, I would think, as I heard, “Yo!” and would say to my husband, “There’s our friend again.” 

Last Tuesday, when I said that, my husband smiled sadly at me and said, “I hate to say this, but I happened to be out on the street watching. There’s only one man on the truck, the driver, who jumps off to pick up the stuff, then jumps back in. And the ‘Yo!’ you hear is a noise the truck makes when it starts up again.” 

“No.” 

“Yes.”  

“No!” 

“Come out and see.” 

“No!” 

I have refused to discuss it any further, refused to let my husband obliterate, dissolve, murder my friend. I think I know what he looks like, not young but vigorous, wearing jeans and a colorful cap to cover his bald spot, a cheerful guy, not without his own troubles, but glad to be doing valuable work. His name is something like Harry — make that Hari, a more International-American name, as befits Berkeley. I’m sure you all know him, and if that’s not his name, you can correct me. And let me know his age, his looks, his family, in case I’m mistaken. I’ll pass the information on to my husband, if and when I start speaking to him again. 

Dorothy Bryant is a Berkeley author.