Fair Trade

There's a family wedding this summer. We updated our passports and bought the plane tickets, the easy parts. I've used the occasion as an excuse to indulge in a personal economic stimulus progam and lavished a couple of new hats on myself. The artisan creation in fine sculpted straw is the color of blood orange juice. The other, a bargain price wide brim Chinese cheapie, machine made in a color described on the label as mustard. I can't decide which outfit and hat ensemble to wear, after which there follows the dilemma of the matching shoes. Gold-plated problems. I should be ashamed of myself I suppose, but I'm not. Maybe I'm just a hat slut. I used to have a collection of vintage cocktail hats with veils and bows, all casualties of the great clean sweep following a painful divorce. But like a pesky dandelion, the hat madness has a tenacious taproot, and continues to hijack my budget.

While I'm trussed and bound up in the fantasy world of personal adornment, the bride to be seems to have succumbed in similar fashion to the fantasy world of happily-ever-after-because-we-have- the-right-man, house, china, furniture, cookware. The happy (I hope) couple are registered in a couple of places, which is a great convenience for the gift buyers and takes a lot of guts on the part of the couple who unwittingly exposed themselves to commentary from miserly and self-righteous curmudgeons like myself on their taste and lifestyle choices. And much as I love them and don't begrudge them their wishlist, I do feel sorry, in a way, that SO MUCH MONEY will be spent on no doubt lovely china and glassware and other trappings of their idea of the properly feathered nest, when I am so keenly aware that millions don't have enough decent food, water and shelter. It goes against the grain from a moral standpoint, and from my cynic's position which is that the couple's successful marriage and happiness does not depend on expensive STUFF. I speak from hard won experience, alas. I've discovered that you have to be happy BEFORE the stuff and that happiness is an attitude one has to cultivate if you didn't grow up in a happy household. Stuff is nice, of course, I like my stuff a lot.

I'll go along with the gifts, after all, I've already generously donated to my own wardrobe to celebrate the occasion (an excuse, I know) because I support the couple's intention, which is to create a life of happiness together. If decent dishware helps, who am I to judge? To even the score, though, I secretly plan to make an equivalent charitable contribution to a group of African ladies who are struggling to overcome circumstances unimaginable to us pampered and privileged suburbanites. It's the only way I can wear fancy hats and eat off shiny platters with a somewhat easy mind for a few hours. Happiness is sometimes as simple as a clear conscience.