The other day I went to buy a cd player.
I know! I’m such a dinosaur! Do people even buy cd players anymore?!?
The story is…. My old cd player, which I have had for 15 years, recently died during our house moving adventure.
I was really sad to let it go. So instead of throwing it in the bin, I moved it to the shed. Which of course, is how we get into our “we have too much sentimental junk problem”.
I didn’t really want a NEW cd player. I just wanted my old one to work again.
I got a quote, and it cost $100 for someone to take it apart and LOOK AT IT.
Sigh. So I decided that I just wanted a cheap replacement. I spent days scouring secondhand stores, ebay, gumtree. Everyone seemed to offer $50-$70 for one, but no one could GUARANTEE that the cd player would work well.
So I finally decided to suck it up and buy a new one for $100.
But even THAT was such a hassle. I had to go to 3 stores until I could find what I wanted, and THEN I was told that they didn’t have it in stock and I’d have to wait 2 weeks for it blah blah blah. So after going to yet another store, I finally found something adequate, and reluctantly bought it.
I walked out of the shop and I was so grumpy.
The sales guy talked down to me. The cashier was rude. The queue was so long. I should have bought it online. I didn’t want a NEW one. Why did my old cd player have to break anyway? I just wanted a cheap secondhand one. I’m sure the world was full of old but perfectly working cd players, but why couldn’t I find one? Now here I am producing more landfill for the earth…
I stepped onto the carpark footpath… and a car zoomed around the corner so quickly that it jumped up onto the footpath and it almost knocked me over.
And it was just one of those moments.
If I had been walking just that *little bit* faster, the car would have smashed into my knees, bowled me head-first into the pavement, and my legs might have been crushed.
I stood there completely stunned.
Me, holding my brand new cd player.
Me, with my brain moving in slow motion, trying to digest what had happened.
I wasn’t upset that I could have broken my legs, shattered my teeth, damaged my spine, and cracked my head.
I wasn’t upset that the guy driving the car was talking on his mobile phone, driving too fast, AND driving on the footpath.
…For some reason I was upset that I could have lost my new cd player.
Yeah the thing that I didn’t really want.
I looked at the box in my hands. I imagined it all smashed up… torn cardboard corrugations, black shards of plastic, broken silver buttons and colourful wires tangled and spilled out all over the road.
Yet here it is. Still intact. Just like me.
I gave the box in my arms a little hug.
And I decided that the cd player wasn’t so bad, and we could definitely be friends now.
(Isn’t it silly how it takes a near death experience before we appreciate what we have. Even when we didn’t want it.)
