Leftovers and Hand me downs

My grandson reached down and found a hole in his comfy pair of socks.  He worked on it and worked on it, trying to make the hole bigger. 
  

“Don’t do that.  I can fix it.”

“That’s okay.  Mama can buy me more.”

His older brother hadn’t worn a favorite shirt in a long time. “It’s missing a button.”

“Bring it over.  I can fix it.”

He looked at me as if I were speaking in tongues.

We chip a tiny corner on our favorite cereal bowl. We accidentally bleach a white spot on a new shirt. We don’t wear a dress or a pair of pants because we don’t have time to mend a rip.

And they go into the recycle or the donation pile.  Ignored.

We do the same with food. We order too much lunch, we make too much for a meal, we serve ourselves more than we can eat at one sitting.  We keep leftovers only long enough until we can pitch them in the trash without guilt.  

What waste:  one tiny imperfection; one slight abuse, and we discard, erase, start over.

I darned my grandson’s socks.  I appliquéd a red rose over the bleached white spot on my shirt.  I fixed the tiny rip. I order only what I will eat at one sitting, I make only enough for one meal, and I recycle leftovers in the refrigerator until they are truly inedible.

Where did I learn my frugality?

I AM imperfection: the sock with the tiny hole on its toe, the chipped bowl, the ripped hem.