Perspective.
That word keeps coming up in my world lately. Although I try to be open-minded and not so self-centered in the bubble of my world, I will admit that I often lose perspective in some areas of my day-to-day life. And so, God threw me into the following situation for a lesson on perspective.
Scene: Target, Diaper Aisle
First, I’ll back up a bit. I love the Target ad. It’s something I look forward to every Sunday morning…flipping through the Target ad while sipping my chai tea and ignoring the chaos in the kitchen. I love the Target ad even more when they have diaper deals – the buy so many diapers and get Target gift cards kind of deals. See, in our house…we ALWAYS need diapers. (Although Charlotte is doing great for just starting potty training!) And I am not the type to run out. No late night trips to Kroger because we used the last diaper. I’m a stocker-upper.
So here I am at Target in the diaper aisle trying to figure out what the deal is (in the ad) and what I need to purchase. I throw 2 boxes of Pampers in the cart, search around and follow it with 2 boxes of Luvs. Mission accomplished. Two gift cards will be received at check-out and I’ll be stocked up = yippee!
Then I overhear an older man say to a younger lady (father/daughter I believe?) with a small child…”Looks like there’s a diaper deal…let’s read this.” And her immediate reply, “Sure, if we had an extra $15 bucks to even spend this week.” Then she grabs a small pack of generic diapers and glances my way. My way = cartload of diapers.
Nothing like a swift kick of I-need-not-take-for-granted-that-purchasing-diapers-is-no-big-deal whereas this poor woman was obviously not in the same situation. She had a whole different perspective on having to buy diapers. So at that point, I wanted to crawl into my cart, hide behind the diapers and apologize, but chose to just dash away. The thought crossed my mind to buy her a box, but I figured that would just be insulting. So instead, I gave a prayer of thanks and made sure to do a separate good deed that day instead.
Aww, that’s tough for her. FYI: the up&up brand of diapers at Target are AMAZING! They are my favorite by far. We started using them when Leila was 10 months old. Not only are they super absorbent and cute(LOVE the blue and green polka dots), but they are way less expensive than almost all of the other brands(even when the others are on sale). We turned one of our very affluent friends on to them and they thank us every time we see them for saving them hundreds of dollars.
Thanks Jess – good to know about the diapers.