One of the chores of living in the free world is picking up other people’s trash.  In our neighborhood, this includes dog droppings, stomped plastic water bottles, dented drink cans, crumpled fast food bags, baby wipes, and pieces of boxes and packing material that once held something that brought  someone joy.

No, we don’t live in a landfill. Our surroundings are well-landscaped, so anything that doesn’t belong is all too easy to see. When we walk our dogs, visit the mail box, roll out the trash cans or go out to pick up the morning newspapers, my wife and I take note of the weather, inspect whatever is green or blooming in the front and side gardens, and then scan our immediate surroundings, our eyes sweeping left to right, for yucky stuff scattered by those who feel free to do so.

We actually caught someone in the act a few days ago. “Pick up the poop!” my wife said to the culprit, who stopped in her tracks, dragged her dog back to the scene of the crime, removed the offending pile and then left an even larger pile in front of our house the following morning.

Of course, not everything we find is garbage. I cringed at the sleepless nights awaiting whoever strolled a baby and didn’t see the infant fling away a pacifier. Melting snow will reveal a lost glove, scarf, reading glasses.  caused by an infant’s pacifier hiding in the bushes. Those we put where they could be seen, at the edge of the sidewalk, atop a fire hydrant or hanging from a road sign with the hope that those who lost them will retrace their steps and find them.

We had a problem with the pen. It appeared to be an ordinary black plastic ball point until we looked closer and saw, in fading gold ink, the seal of the US Department of Defense. Next to that, in the same fading gold, was a loopy signature. I squinted and couldn’t figure it out.

My wife could. “Donald Rumsfeld,” she said.

I glanced around at the staid, respectable beige-and-brick facades of our suburban enclave. Some who lived among us were retired military, intelligence, state department and aerospace. Might this belong to a neighbor who had worked for Rumsfeld when he was Secretary of Defense for Presidents Gerald Ford and George W. Bush. Did they remember him as the architect of the Afghanistan and Iraqi wars, the promoter of “shock and awe” and “known unknowns”? Did their retirement package include a souvenir pen and, maybe, a challenge coin?

Or did they find themselves in the Pentagon’s Fort America gift shop one day and figure that a pen emblazoned with Rumsfeld’s signature was the perfect gift for…

Again, we looked around. What home hid the owner of this pen? What might have happened to make them lose it?

We made a guess. We put the pen in front of a door and continued our dog walk.

On the next morning I glanced at that door. The pen was gone.