I bought a $12 dollar air pump from Home Depot the other day because I had finally grown tired of trying to dribble my poor basketball and watching its blob-like form take on the shape of the flat blacktop and proceed to stick there like a bucketful of pancake batter (only a slight exaggeration I assure you!). Excited about this big, red, Husky brand behemoth of a pump, I started to dream about all the other things I could do with it... I woke up from that dream 30 seconds later with not so much as a "hmm... I wonder..." to show for it.
You see, even though it was only 12 bucks, it's 12 bucks locked into a pump that I won't use for anything else because, let's face it, I'll buy a brand new basketball or give it away before it ever deflates. Besides, at the pace I'm going, I'll end up selling the pump in a garage sale before my next move. Of course you're now coming down on me with the common sense "Well, why didn't you just borrow a pump, silly man?". Well thanks a lot, Baby Einsteins - all 17 of you are coming with me whenever I go to the store from now on!
The larger point I'm aiming to make here is my thought process and the fundamental flaw that's so engrained in our mentality in this country that it may well be our downfall unless we develop some major awareness about its insidious nature:
My basketball is flat = I need to buy (and thus individually own) a pump
As my dad Farris, Jr. would say "You are corr-WRONG!". What I "needed" is to be a part of a community where "I" is instead "we" and "my" is instead "our". Sure, everybody needs their own pair of shoes, but does every single person need their own treadmill? Their own deep fryer? Wet vac? Quite possibly if you run every morning while frying chicken and often spill the oil everywhere and need to vacuum it up, but I don't know that person - do you? Zipcar is making a killing off of a principle that we learned back in kindergarten. Yep, sharing. I think the more we share, the less we'll waste, and thus one step closer to what life is all about.
Just let me know if you're in the area and want to save 30 minutes, $12, and a few miles on your tires... you can definitely borrow my pump! Peace.
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