My Classmates Mocked Me for Being a Garbage Collector’s Son – on Graduation Day, I Said Something They’ll Never Forget

Nobody was lining up to hire her.

The city sanitation department didn’t care about degrees or gaps on a résumé.

They cared if you’d show up before sunrise and keep showing up.

So she put on a reflective vest, climbed onto the back of a truck, and became “the trash lady.”

Which made me “trash lady’s kid.” That name stuck.

“You smell like the garbage truck.”

In elementary school, kids would wrinkle their noses when I sat down.