The Big and Now

My sister found a Prada purse for me at a Goodwill. It cost $5. It was monogrammed with a giant A. It is of good quality, well made and ugly. How do you get rid of a gift.

Get me otta here!

My dislike of designer items came to full flower as a teacher. A principal I worked for did not allow students to wear the new stylish torn at the knees jeans in the late 1980s. It was simple. The poor kids would cut up their pants.

I've been that person desiring the sparkle, the aspiration, the bit of luxury of designer items. Then, like all things it becomes jaded when you wish you had the money you had already spent to pay for something else you need. You chase a fallen star to find a bit rock instead.

Yesterday, I was in line at the car wash. There was two lanes. One for people like me who had a monthly plan for unlimited car washes and the other for pay as you go folks. Well this woman cuts me off in her brand new white Lexus. I don't know if it was a valuable one or just a new one of the lesser cost variety. What I thought was, I was not impressed with her pretty car.

And would you know it, the woman that followed her shoved ahead too. So I rolled down the window to the kid who was supposed to be monitoring the lanes and told him. You have got to help me out. When a space opens, these folks are gunning ahead of me.

The woman stops with a gap much too small for me to enter. Clearly she had been caught. I grit my teeth and just look at her. Resigned, she takes her coveted spot. The kid is awake enough to stop the third car.

This behavior worries me more about this country than the incredulous nuttiness of this year's presidential election. It's not that I was so concerned about getting in line and getting my car washed promptly. I had sat in the parking lot and ate a frozen yogurt in hopes the line would lessen.

The nastiness and twisted logic of political ads is not the real problem. It is the people who get so fired up to vote based on agreeing to them. You would think they were hollering about people breaking in the car wash line instead of unfriending folks.

When it comes to the woman in the Lexus and the woman behind her, they may have truly been desperate to move through the line quickly. Something in their worlds may end if their cars were not clean and they weren't on their way within the about two minutes they saved breaking ahead.

I slip in the grocery store to get a pack of bacon for deviled eggs. I decide to get another dozen of eggs for Easter. There is this woman hovering in front of the eggs. Undecided between the cage-free and the regular eggs, she grabs regular eggs and puts them in the buggy that hubby is pushing. I'm politely waiting. She is still in her universe which apparently is not a pleasant place by the look on her face and moves very slowly. She is still eyeing the cage-free eggs.

I wait for Hubby to move on. But he has watched me. He is going to wait until I get my eggs. I tell him the truth. I'm not in a hurry. I smile at him, he smiles at me and moves on. His child is walking beside him holding his arm. I get my eggs.

I stopped at the recycling center to unload the recyclables loaded in my trunk. A woman younger than me with a cane was getting her items out. I asked if she would like some help. She handed me carefully organized items in bags to carry to the different bins. She thanks me and says someone always helps her.

Meanwhile we got riots breaking out all over. Riots of spring flowers clamoring for their day in the sun. I hope there are enough bees, bugs, etc to do the job. We need more riots of flowers.

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