It's Raining Sneakers

There's a bag filled with sneakers in my daughter's bathroom. I don't know why they're there, but I have my suspicions. Several times a year, giant bags filled with various types of clothing begin to appear in my daughter's room, bags that inevitably find their way out to the trash can. Funny; I can't remember ever throwing clothes out when I was a teenager. I don't know if it's a gender thing or one of the sick symptoms of affluence.

I just read an article on illegal immigration from Mexico, where I found a statistic stating that the the disparity in wealth between Mexico and the United States is the greatest of any two countries sharing a border. And then I mentally tally the cost of the shoes in the bag in my daughter's bathroom. Six pairs of shoes, and the average cost is at least twenty dollars, maybe thirty.

I can tie this into any of a dozen different thoughts. That which is given to you is worthless; that for which you have to work is dear. That'd be one of them. It makes me wonder about the Paris Hiltons of the world, people who were born swimming in money. A billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon we're talking about real money.

And meanwhile, there are all those kids sneaking across the border, willing to work for practically nothing, all because the economic situation in their own country is hopeless, has always been hopeless, and looks like it will always be hopeless. They could probably use those shoes we're throwing out.