The glories of finally finding a Goodwill "nearby" and getting a pair of dress pants from the Limited for $8. This is my kind of shopping. No excess consumption or support of large corporations. Saving money. Putting people to work. How many other happy options like this exist, surely they must be in New York? In this city there is so much and yet people are hungry. I look at the salad bars overflowing with toppings that can't possibly all be calculated to be consumed in a single day, and all the produce lying in the fruit stands, and yet there are so many people begging for money. It's hard to ride the train without a person soliciting money for one thing or another. How can we match up these inequalities, some of too much, some of too little? We are in a lopsided world and this is a city in the middle of it, spinning it around, a revolving door of rich and poor, fueling one another but never meeting.
I suppose the same was true in the midwest. But somehow it is more pronounced here, and the act of shopping at Goodwill seems far more defiant of the economy of this place, far more radical. And for that reason, far more pleasing and rewarding. In some very, very small way I've put a dent in an unbeatable system.
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