Surplus To Requirements

16 Ramadhan, 1440

We're careful with food generally, and especially so in the fasting month. Careful, that is, to avoid putting too much on the table. There's a temptation to do so, but we've learnt to resist it. It's a hoary old cliché, and, like most such clichés, it's old and well-worn since it's deeply true, that to waste food in a world in which so many are deprived is contemptible. But we've thrown some out tonight, and this, I suspect, will happen again before the month is out.

We live in a place of surplus in what for us is an age of surplus. It seems that in these circumstances waste cannot be helped. Maybe so, but the experience of fasting is a useful reminder that what we take for granted should not be taken for granted. Guilt is one of the most useful of all emotions, if it can become the basis of something helpful to others. Something to work at, there.