By D.K. McCutchen
Dear George was as smart in his field as he was clueless about people. But he’d been told he was Brilliant! He was a Chemical Engineer who’d become obsessed with a common bacterium, Comamonas testosteroni, a bacteria as knuckleheaded-sounding as George. George just knew C. testosteroni could become nature’s little plastic recycling center. Then he would be the hero that saved –everything!
Never mind that a PhD student at the Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research had said the same thing — waaaay back in 2023 — about Rhodococcus ruber, that supposedly ate and digested plastic.
Or that the Kyoto Institute of Technology, Japan, first discovered plastic eating bacteria when they identified Ideonella sakaiensis even further back in 2016.
And let’s just forget that 16-year old Canadian brat, who was acknowledged at the Canada-wide Science Fair in Ottawa —in 2008! –for discovering that Sphingomonas and Pseudomonas could break down polyethylene bags. The kid even suggested a recycling process! George didn’t acknowledge that one. They weren’t an adult — what did they know! George hoped the kid went bald in later life. George himself had an enviable thick head of hair. George was an adult.
But, none of this solved the actual problem. With at least 12 million tons of plastics dumping into the ocean every year, back when the human population was bigger. And with how dangerous plastic was to whatever wildlife was left, the Problem was not breaking-down plastic (George had that in the bag), but in removing it from the ocean. However, George was able to compartmentalize. So he put “removal” firmly out of mind as impossible, and continued to research C. testosteroni as his favorite contender to just dissolve plastic altogether.
George rarely thought things through. Look at his love life! George was in love with the Chancellor’s Wife. George had never willed someone more happiness than himself. Marais was just so confident. She made firm decisions based on clearly articulated ethics! She was beautiful, inside and out. And it was so clear that the Chancellor just didn’t care!
Today Marais had come to him saying she’d had enough, it was time to leave. She intended to go to sea. George slowed her down, made her think things through, consider her options. By the time she mentioned it was a chance for George himself to reach beyond his current research limitations, show off his discoveries to the overseas Polymer researchers in the UK—with whom he used to communicate weekly—and get the recognition he deserved — that’s when George became convinced she HAD A POINT. They would go to sea together! He had a little hydrofoil for his research. It wouldn’t foul a propeller in the Great Garbage Ocean. He also had a huge craving to exchange ideas with other experts in his field and prove his excellence! And he would be with the Chancellor’s Wife.
George would save the world!
D.K. McCutchen’s speculative fiction trilogy includes Jellyfish Dreaming (Vol. 1, 2023) a Leapfrog Global Fiction Prize winner; Electric Ice (Vol. 2, 2024) Speculative Literature Foundation grant recipient, and “Plastic Eaters” (Vol. 3, in progress). D.K. teaches writing for the College of Natural Sciences, UMass, and is Associate Director of the Junior Year Writing program.