The basement’s a mess. It’s the place in which all the household gear that we don’t know what to do with are unceremoniously dumped with nary a word or a thought to the many years of useful service these devices have rendered. There’s a ripped-open VCR — deliberately discombobulated by my mom when it chose to devour my videotape of the first week of the 2006 Tour de France. There are a couple of old 13-inch TVs. If you brush away the dust, you can find an old microwave that’s roughly the size of a SmartCar. Oh, and don’t forget the toaster-sized cell phone!

They’ve been lingering down there because one of us had read somewhere or another that there was something or another in these devices that made them hazardous to just toss into the trash bin. Later research proved the case. According to the Environmental Protection Agency web site, electronics may contain lead, mercury, cadmium and flame retardants.

Knowing that the county periodically held electronics recycling events, I thought we would keep the items until one rolled around again. Again is the key word. Usually, I found out about the event when the evening news on some beautiful spring Saturday would feature a story about the amount of aged PCs dropped off.

This year, by some fluke, I actually found out about e-recycling the day BEFORE the event. I whirled through the basement digging out old, abandoned items. I stuffed them in my car on Friday night so I could be at the recycling site as close to when it opened as possible. The theory was that I could be in and out before the rest of the county woke up.

Wrong.

Apparently the rest of the county had messy basements as well.

I followed the signs to the recycling site only to discover that probably 40 other cars were already in line only minutes after the event started. I thought the day would be shot to pieces and was quite happy that I brought Francis Chan’s Crazy Love along to read while I waited.

Turns out that the recycling operation was slicker than I thought. The line moved quickly. When it was my turn, I pulled the car up between a couple of cones, popped the trunk and stayed in the car as instructed by the friendly fire policeman. A swarm of guys started pulling the gear out of the trunk and backseat. In less than 90 seconds, they had cleared it all out.

I was free.

The old electronics were on their way to safe disposal. I had done my part to cut back on an ever-increasing part of the solid waste stream.

All the same, I wonder … and as I am not gifted with any sort of brains for such inventions … could our electronics be made out of something that isn’t hazardous? Can they be made of recycled materials?

After all, the professor on Gilligan’s Island could make anything out of a coconut shell …