FoLAR: LA River cleanup

Hello, my name is Alan Linan; I'm a student at Calstate LA and I'm enrolled in Professor Hernandez' English 2030 class. As an assignment, we have been given the task of cleaning up the Los Angeles river. Currently, I reside in San Diego county so this was my first encounter with the river. I've never heard good things about the water in this river and the rumors were not too far off. The amount of plastic, among other things,  that was entangled in the foliage was astonishing. What would seem like an easy piece of trash to remove, was actually a piece of trash that was deeply embellished within the plant. The ground had pieces of trash in all over it; it was easy to see how much humans have impacted the ecosystems of this river. I did what I could to take as many pieces of trash and do my part; it didn't take long to fill out the bag trash. In fact, the bag became so heavy that it started to rip open in a matter of minutes. I am happy to say that there were multiple people with us to help clean the river; however, we were not equipped to take out the giant pieces of trash that were located at the river bed. From mattresses to empty shopping carts, the river was littered with macro-pieces of trash that proved difficult to carry out. One thing that stood out to me was the resiliency of mother nature; for, in the  midst all of the trash, I found a bush that was ripe with raspberries. Even when we litter and take advantage of nature, it still has the will to produce its nourishment.