MATERIALISM

At left is the Bonsai tree my husband bought in honor of our 45th wedding anniversary this past week end. Think it's kind of appropriate in many ways. Maybe it will become an heirloom to pass on?

Anyway, yesterday as I was "conversing" via e-mail with my youngest son, the topic of materialism came up. He fears his daughters will grow up to be very materialistic. And I wonder..just where does this all start? Is it something we're born with or something we acquire. The subject interests me because I just finished a book where the main characters were extremely materialistic----BUT not in the very end. In literally, the final pages of the book, it all came down to unselfish love--although having material things did enhance it! The point was that what was truly enduring were the feelings people ultimately had for one another and I wonder if this is true and if so, where and when does materialism start?

Growing up in the Lutheran church, I got a daily dose of Christ's altruistic lifestyle. The message was clear: materialism was bad; altruism was good. Being unselfish and kind--not necessarily loving--never really got that "loving" message--was a good thing. The God I learned of in Lutheran school was not necessarily a loving God or at the very least he was only loving if I was a "good" girl. And part of being good meant being altruistic. It meant putting others before myself. It meant sacrificing for the good of others whether they appreciated it or not. It meant always putting myself last.

These feelings were fostered in my home as well. Being the oldest it was expected that I'd take on certain responsibilities especially as regarding my younger siblings. I was to be their second mom. Their needs would always come before mine.

Materialistically, we didn't have that much--especially by today's standards. Hand-me-downs were the rule of the day and we were grateful for them. Of course, if there was a hand-me-down from my cousins for me, that would mean, ultimately, that it would continue to be passed down eventually to my sister--even though she was 10 yrs. older. We never threw anything away or looked down on something because it wasn't the proper label. We were grateful to have another piece of clothing for our backs or another piece of furniture for our house. We didn't throw things away because one never knew when the next depression would hit or some other disaster would strike and then we'd be even more grateful that we had what we had.

I'd like to explore this topic more in future posts but right now I've run out of my allotted time for my blog and I need to go feed my chickens! But I'll be back tomorrow and think more about this during the day.

Peace and Love,

Carol