Thursday, May 14, 2020

Trek Day Eleven

revenge of the gadgets
"Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." -- from Matthew 6:19-21

In today's Trek card, Jon Rudy confesses to being a typical male gadgeteer. He names computer and printer hardware he covets, a quality camera, the latest software, and other electronic gadgets. He says:

...the list goes on. I have had a buying moratorium on gadgets for the last three years while in Swaziland and now, on home leave, there was time to make up. So, armed with a credit card and three-years worth of gadget savings, I struck out on the 800-number trail. Soon the delivery person was beating a path to our door. Box after box, invoice upon invoice came piling in. What fun! Like Christmas. Like Christmas ... too much like Christmas. North American Christmases are notorious for their emphasis on material things -- gadgets.

I don't share Jon's enthusiasm for techie gadgets (although, since March 15th, I've been thrown in the deep-end of the tech-pool and sometimes wish I had a few better things). Still, I certainly understand the longing, justification, ordering, unwrapping, and regretting cycle that often results when one of my own passions are stirred. (Gardening, sewing, reading, crafting, home decorating) And whether I "love" them or not, I've bought more than my share of tech-gadgets that are obsolete within a year or two after purchase.
Today's card talks about the "first set of things" which we need to sustain our lives and the "second and third sets of things" that weigh us down and sap our energy. I spoke yesterday about how the abundance of things on my countertops often saps my energy. To feel really weighed down, all I have to do is open a closet.

Another insightful quote, this time from Victor Lebow, retail analyst:

Our enormously productive economy … demands that we make consumption our way of life, that we convert the buying and use of goods into rituals, that we seek our spiritual satisfaction, our ego satisfaction, in consumption ... 
We need things consumed, burned up, worn out, replaced, and discarded at an ever increasing rate.

I find myself wondering how much of the stuff Jon bought twenty years ago, when he was home on leave from global service, is still taking up space in a landfill somewhere on the globe. And leaking toxins. How many of my own "Christmas-like" purchases are doing the same?
Those who know me, know I regularly mount a soapbox about waste. Plastic waste, food waste, yada, yada, yada. So my eyes were riveted to the title of the book which quoted Lebow above: The Waste Makers. I was stunned to read that the book's copyright was 1960, a year before I was born. 

Maya Angelou is often quoted as saying, "Do the best that you can until you know better. Then, when you know better, do better." Shouldn't we be doing better by now?

Questions for Today
What are my triggers for consumer behavior I wish I could change?
How could I simplify my lifestyle in ways that would enrich my daily experiences?
How much of what I buy in a given year ends up in a trash heap like the one above?
In what ways does the marketing and packaging of stuff I buy lead to planetary harm?



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