Gratitude for the Toasters and Chairs in our Lives

Good things happen when we show gratitude for the wonderful way that products fulfill their function for us. It’s a small way of honoring the crafts people who make them and it might encourage us to use up the products we have and draw more enjoyment out of them.

I was reminded today of the significance objects that we pay little attention to normally, but in reality play a very vital role in our days and in making our lives a bit better each day. I’m talking about the toasters, floor rugs, favorite hand lotions, and the like. And tonight I was reminded of what a special duty an old wooden chair I have setup on my balcony has fulfilled well over the last decade.

The chair is grey with weather and the wood is probably pretty delicate by now. It’s been somewhat precarious to sit on for the last year, but tonight, it showed serious signs that it’s probably time to thank it for it fulfilling its job for me and to look for a replacement.

What’s strange is that over its 10 year life, I probably haven’t given it more than a passing thought of how well it has supported me. How many summer afternoons it’s made incrementally better because I could count on a pleasant sit while reading and sipping my iced Diet Coke. How often I would reward myself for getting my work done, by promising myself hours out in that chair enjoying some sun, some bird song, and some great relaxation.

It is ridiculously easy these days to replace things. We in fact are often encouraged to throw out things that still have a lot of useful life left in the pursuit of the new or the next great trendy thing. I know I’m a sucker for Amazon’s One-Day shipping like most of us. In a time when practically anything can be shipped right to our door within a day or two in their shiny new glory, it can be so easy to forgot the people who make the things we buy, the materials they come from, and the lost potential and under utilization that those cast out products experience.

That great old chair reminded me of so many other items I gain a bit of satisfaction from practically every day. And though, I’m certainly not advocating for personifying our microwaves, but I think some good things happen to us personally when we show gratitude that we live in a place and a time when such amazing conveniences are so accessible. I think if we show gratitude at the end of the life of a product for the wonderful way that the product fulfilled its function for us, we can honor the crafts people or the factory workers or the farmers or the timber operators who cut the trees that make up the wood that chairs like mine are made of. And if do that, maybe it’ll encourage us to use up the products we have and perhaps draw a bit more enjoyment out of the products we already have.

And, if any of you know of a good wood worker in the Portland area who could make a nice Adirondack chair, send them my way.