Science Forward

It was a breezy afternoon on Halloween when I arrived. The sun was high in the sky, with its rays ever so slightly filtered by the translucent spread of the clouds.

I had expected the beach to be a mess; a coastal landscape reflecting a similar disorganization to that of my own room. At a distance, however, it appeared to me that there was hardly any plastic at all. Disregarding the branches and shells strewn across the plane, the beach was neat and seemingly unfazed by the immense disposal of plastics that, according to scientists and media sources, had infested even the quaintest of areas.

Nevertheless, as I had approached the past and future nests of the indigenous horseshoe crabs I noticed that, in fact, the beach was quite littered. The vast array of bottles, cigar tips, and plastic bags had been obfuscated by the sheer volume of the sand and shells, and as Matt, Renee, Jenny and I began to reap our harvest of plastics, the high tide of reality had engulfed our minds.

There was no end.

For every piece of plastic we had collected, we found ten more in its vicinity. After several hours of identification and collection, we were fatigued, cold, hungry, and ready to go home.

We said our goodbyes to one another and to Professor Branco.

I doubt we will say goodbye to the plastics contaminating our planet any time soon.