One Bag at a Time: Picking Up Trash on My Walks in Utila by Mark Edgington

When I go out for a walk in Utila, I’m usually trying to get into Zone 2. That’s the range where your heart rate’s up but you’re not dying. Forty-five minutes of steady movement, nothing dramatic. Just walking and breathing.

But my walks don’t usually go uninterrupted, because every few steps, there’s something on the ground. A plastic bottle. A chip wrapper. The occasional lone flip-flop, for some reason always without its match. So I stop, pick it up, and keep walking. By the end, the grocery bag I brought is full, and I drop it in the nearest bin.

It’s not glamorous. I’m not out there performing an act of heroism. I’m sweating, trying to get my steps in, and cleaning up after people I’ve never met. But the way I see it, if I walk past it, who else is going to pick it up?

Utila is beautiful. People travel thousands of miles to see its beaches and coral reefs. But trash still washes up, just like everywhere else. Some of it is local. Some of it floats here from somewhere far away. All of it ends up in the same place if no one does anything about it.

This isn’t going to change the world. I know that. I’m not cleaning the ocean by myself. But I’ve learned that small actions matter. Just the kind of thing that keeps your conscience clear.

Whether it’s picking up a piece of trash or owning up to something harder, I think there’s value in doing the small, right thing.

— Mark Edgington

This article also appears on https://medium.com/@edgington.teams, where you can learn more about Mark’s ongoing work.