On Gratitude and Toilet Paper Rolls

Toilet Paper Rolls

After the last post, you may find it humorous to know that I am still thinking about bathroom issues.
This time, my thoughts center on gratitude.

Consider the latest entry in my gratitude journal:

The excitement I feel when I receive a kindergarten newsletter asking for families to save toilet paper rolls for a spring art project.

Knowing full well that I have an entire drawer full of saved toilet paper rolls for such a time as this.
Happy to be able to clean out my drawer, and happy to help out in the classroom.

One of the throwbacks to being a former elementary school teacher is that I cannot bring myself to part with useful items such as toilet paper rolls (and let's not forget paper towel rolls too)!
"Someone can use this!" courses through my thoughts.

Another part of my hoarding recyclable materials is my having lived in Africa for two years.

It's a bit of a paradox. I hold on to things because I have seen people who have so very little and would love to use what I throw away. I remember once walking a dirt path with my Cameroonian friend and being aghast that she would drink juice from a small tin can and then pitch the can along the path as she continued walking. My American upbringing of watching public service announcements on Saturday mornings in between cartoons was screaming: "Remember Woodsy the Owl! Give a Hoot! Don't pollute!" But in her way of thinking, since there were ZERO recycling facilities available, to throw the can down was the kindest most practical thing since "someone else can find it and use it".

So, I admit it. I'm a hoarder of toilet paper rolls. But on a day like today, when the call comes to save rolls...I am amply prepared! And I feel justified.

Gratitude

Recently our women's ministry had a retreat to focus on the practice of gratitude. We used the book One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp as a spring point for discussion. My gratitude-minded friend had made me a gratitude journal a few years back (and I am grateful that she did, because her craftsmanship is much more beautiful than the spiral-bound notebook I would have been using). When I returned home from the retreat, it was fun and enlightening to count and see how many things I had already listed. Today's entry of "toilet paper rolls, already collected" is number 602.

May I always have eyes to see the provision of God around me.