Stuck on you
I take it back! I had posted my refusal to commit to a single label company-- Mabel's is unimpeachable, but Oliver's has more options, and some other people who sent me a press release make alarming but potentially useful "Peanut (or whatever) allergy" labels that I suppose you could stick directly on your preverbal kid if labeling his stuff wasn't good enough. Mabel's won me back, though. by sending me a thoughtful gift. Just like your mother always told you to do.
Have you read about that weird new regulation which would obligate bloggers to disclose any freebies or payments they'd received for mentioning a particular producr? I've examined the issue thoroughly, myself, and come to the conclusion that I don't give a rat's rectum if bloggers disclose that stuff or not, but I will happily disclose the fact that the Mabel's people, possibly Mabel herself, if there is one, stumbled upon me rattling on here about bizarro double-blind virtual lost-and-found systems and how all you really need is a phone number and a lack of crippling paranoia and you can dispense with the middle man, and they sent me... stickers with my cell phone number on them! I love them! Mabel's, I mean. The stickers are nice too.
Seriously, the more I think about it the more irritated I get at the assumption that people who find a single lost froggy rainboot and bother to try to reunite it with its owner are likely to be pedophiles or psychokillers who habitually haunt the parks and playgrounds hoping to find just such an opportunity to HUNT YOU DOWN AND TAKE YOUR CHILD. If the promoters of such systems don't believe this themselves (and I bet they don't), they certainly hope you will believe it. And I don't.
I have read The Gift Of Fear and I recommend it, but nowhere have I seen Gavin de Becker or any other safety- or self-defense expert insist that everyone is, even potentially, out to get you. Rather, they tell you that your own instincts are better than you give them credit for, and to follow them, even if it feels unfriendly or downright rude. They tell you that there are almost always warning signs, and your major contributon to your own safety is to note them and respond to them. They do NOT tell you that everyone sucks. And I tell you that most people who find your kid's lost froggy boot and try to return it are going to be among the non-sucky majority. And (and this is where I start sounding a little cornball, especially to myself) those little moments, the one where you see someone drop her glove and you run after her to give it back, the one where someone dashes forward to hit the "door open" button for you so the train door won't cut your foot off, even the times when you return to the park in search of that lost rain-boot and find that someone has placed it, with care, atop a railing to be sure you can see it... these are the moments that make city living feel village-like and cozy, not only bearable but actively lovely. They turn the faceless jostling crowd from a mass of potentially hostile hassles and impositions to... people. People who might be on your side.These moments cannot be replaced by a sticker and an online code. So there, Found-it Tracking System TM. I'm going with the phone number, the assumption of decency, and Mabel's.
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