My Daily Dives In The Dumpster Analysis

In Analyzing Parts of “My Daily Dives in the Dumpster”
In the essay “My Daily Dives in the Dumpster,” Lars Eighner—an educated yet homeless individual—recounts his experience as a scavenger who seeks for his basic necessities in dumpsters. On his journey of survival in a penniless condition, Eighner has acquired important life skills and most importantly, gained valuable insights about life and materialism. Throughout his essay, Eigher employs deliberate word choice, a didactic tone, and a logical organization to convey that there is no shame in living “from the refuse of others” (Eighner) and to emphasize that materialistic possessions do not guarantee a fulfilled, happy life. In the first three paragraphs of the essay’s introduction, Eigher discusses his preference of the words that he uses to label himself and his lifestyle. The author admits that he prefers the word “scavenging” to the word “foraging” when it comes to describing his lifestyle. For Eighner, the term “foraging” possesses a polite connotation and is strictly reserved for the gathering of nuts and berries. Thus, it does not accurately describe his way of living as a “dumpster diver.” The word “scavenging,” on the other hand, elicits a sense of primitiveness and accurately depicts what Eigher does in reality.

Ultimately, thanks to his “scavenging” journey, Eighner has learned to live on the disposal of others by filtering out what is useful to keep and what is useless to remove. Most importantly, he becomes aware that the balances between wants and needs and between material possessions and freedom of burdens can lead to happiness, or what Eighner calls—“a healthy state of