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Tuesday, October 9, 2012

A Tale of Two Catalogs

Today I received two holiday catalogs in the mail.
 
Pottery Barn and World Vision.
 
The pottery barn catalog made me feel holiday-ish and nostalgic, and instilled in me a huge urge to own a large platter in the shape of a turkey. No seriously. I'm pretty sure that's what the pilgrims served the Indians (er- Native Americans) dinner with, right? The pictures are pretty and shiny and happy and make me feel like I need to have pretty and shiny things to be happy. And there is nothing wrong with owning pretty and shiny things. They do make me happy.
 
The World Vision catalog made me cry. Actual tears. Legit tears.
 (Has anyone seen my hormones?)
 
It's not a sad catalog with pictures of starving kids. To the contrary actually. The photographs show happy people. People who are holding animals and supplies that were bought by strangers in other, wealthier countries who realized that it's not all about shiny and pretty. And I guess that's what makes me cry. The loveliness of it all.
 
Last year I bought a couple goats for someone through World Vision. And before you get any thoughts like, "Oh that Jana is SO benevolent and awesome to the max!" you should know that I paid for it with a Visa gift card that I got from AT&T U-Verse for signing up for television service. So no, it wasn't all that benevolent and awesome. I didn't even really earn the money.
 
But it felt really good to spend that money on World Vision. I did it in Wes' name and they sent a little thank you card to him.  I cut out the picture in the catalog and put it with the thank you and stuck it in his baby book (which let's face it- has nothing written in it yet).
 
Tomorrow I'm going to look at the World Vision catalog with him and try to teach him animal noises. Which is probably pointless because I don't know what kind of noises alpacas make and whenever I ask Wes what ANY animal says he responds with "ROOOOAAAARRR!"
 
So I guess I have choices this Christmas. Buy a ceramic turkey? Or buy a real bird.
 
Keep the catalogs coming World Vision. You've got a lot of competition out there.
 
 
To hook those in need up with proper goods, visit www.worldvisiongifts.org.

1 comment:

Grant said...

That's awesome Jana! There has always been something inside me thats wanted to by a yak and your saying it's actually possible! Seriously though, good reminder on the "real" needs of life.