Thoughtful Saturday

Once again, I failed to be thoughtful on Thursday- but I made up for it on Saturday.

For the past few years, I have been trying to practice mindful consumption, that is, sarefully considering the things that I buy and bring into my home and the impact every purchase I make has on my family, my local economy, other people and my planet. It is difficult to give every purchase the consideration it deserves, for instance I can't take the time to weight the pros and cons of organically grown, trucked-in fruit versus traditionally grown local fruit every time I go to the grocery store- and more often than not it isn't crystal clear which is the best purchase.
For instance, my husband needs to buy a lot of tools for his job. These are tools he will use for the rest of his working life, so quality is important. Craftsman tools are well-made, guarnateed for life and made in the USA, all good things, but sold by Sears who downsized my uncle just before he was fully vested in his retirement, bad thing. We hold our nose and buy Craftsman tools.
So the point of mindful consumption is not necessarily to make the correct choices, but to consider production practices, transportation, employment practices of manufacturers and distributors, etc, as well as how an item will be received in your home. It doesn't do any good to make a earth-friendly purchase if the item goes unused at home.

All of this brings me to a carefully-considered purchase I made on Saturday. The new cat, Gary, has transitioned beautifully to our family, so we decided to fully accessorize him.
When we bought litter and a scoop at Petco, we looked at cat trees and toys and I noticed some things. 1. The toys seemed really expensive, like $5 or $6 for the lame ones and over $10 for the cool ones that bounced or came attached to a rod, and 2. the cat trees were cheap, and looked it.
Not satisfied, I decided to look around at Target and the farm store to see if I could find something nicer. Maybe it's unusual to want a nice cat tree, since the cat is supposed to scratch it and get it all cat-hairy, but I just think if I were a cat I would want my furniture to have nice carpet, not the shitty indoor/outdoor carpet I had seen.
Target and the farm store had similar items, plus these Kitty City pop-up "houses" for cats made out of wire and canvas and I guess you can velcro them together... I dunno, the whole thing looks like failure waiting to happen.
So I went to Corvallis to the Cat's meow thrift shop (where I found the incredible orange lamp last year) because I remembered that they have a room with adoptable cats and also cat supplies.
It turns out that the cats have moved to another location, but the room still had a good selection of new and used pet supplies, and I found the perfect cat tree- one stry, small, covered with thick luxurious pile and thick, sturdy berber, for $30, $10 more than the ones I had seen at retail. Madison hauled it up to the counter, along with a couple toys that were a buck or two each. I talked to the cashier a little bit about how much nicer their trees were than the ones I had seen in stores and that it was obvious these were hand-made, and she said that they are hand-made in Corvallis and donated to the shelter, so every dime of my $30 goes to the shelter, instead of to some corporation. I feel great about putting a lot of thought into my purchase.

The cat, however, prefers the couch.

Thoughtful Thursday- pensive Thursday edition

On Thursday, I had an opportunity to pay a sincere compliment to a stranger, but I didn't, because I didn't think it was appropriate.
A representative from a medical supply company brought lunch in for the doctor and the nurse and me. I had been trading emails with this guy for a while trying to get a lunch set up, and he seemed like a nice enough guy. When he showed up, he was not as good looking as most pharmaceutical sales representatives are, but he was clean and well groomed and nicely dressed.
And he smelled like Heaven.
I wanted to tell him that he smelled good and asked him how he achieved his pleasant aroma so that my husband could duplicate it, but then I thought I ought not.
Because even though I wasn't the least bit attracted to this guy, I think that telling someone they smell nice is the same as saying "I think you're hot."
I have also learned that if a guy is troubled enough, saying "Good morning" to him sounds the same to him as "I am really into you." But that's another story- the long story of why I don't talk to strange men at all.

So on Thursday, I wasn't thoughtful (I made up for it on Friday), but I did a lot of thinking.

Thoughtful Thursday: Guilty conscience edition

This morning, the first thing my kid said to me was "Hey, for Thoughtful Thursday, you can donate to OPB."
OPB is Oregon Public Broadcasting, and their winter pledge drive kicked off this morning. Madison knew that because the radio in her room is tuned to OPB 24/7. It's not unusual for her to roll out of bed talking about some international economic crisis or the latest political news.
For the past I don't know how many years, we have listened to the pledge drives, and she has asked me to join. I always tell her that I should, that I should cancel the newspaper subscription since it goes unread, and use that money to support a real local news-gathering organization. But I never have, until today. I made my pledge on line. The donation form had a field for comments, so I wrote in something clever about OPB being the reason my 12 year old is so smart and funny (even though I KNOW that she gets those qualities from her mother) and they read my comment on the air, as they do with all of them. Madison was listening and I think she got kind of a kick out of it- she called me at work to acknowledge the pledge.
I don't know if it is thoughtful to do something when part of the reason for doing it is to assuage guilt about not doing it. But I did it, and I am counting it.

Thoughtful Thursday: Did I say it was easy?

Being thoughtful is hard. I was going to make a $25 microloan on Kiva.org today, but their site is down. Also I think I should take some more time to figure out how to do it right. Maybe there is a better microlending site.
I am knitting golf club covers for my husband, and he said, "That's very thoughtful.", but it doesn't feel thoughtful enough. Maybe I am being too much of a perfectionist about this. I will think about it.