I’ve been thinking a lot about the word “commodity” lately. It’s one of those words I used when I was young to make people think I was smarter than I was. I inferred an implied meaning to it — like “irony” or “pretentious.”

Commodity is a trade good that has been mass produced the same so that as many people (“consumers”) can get their grimy hands on them as possible. Look around. Generally, any small plastic thing you see is a commodity. We’re talking computers, televisions, cell phones, pens, etc. Warning: It might be extremely sobering to realize how many of these are actually lying around.

To bring about a need for a commodity, a large amount of people (consumers) first must want something that is exactly the same — hence, the mass production of, say, plastic dinosaur ice trays. Somehow, a large portion of the population suddenly thinks dinosaur ice trays are the coolest thing since sliced bread … or sliced dinosaur bread. So the dinosaur ice tray factory produces billions of the ice trays, exactly the same.

What if someone wants dinosaur-shaped ice in order to stage a small, pretend carnivorous coup, but he or she cannot wants a variation on the theme? Too bad. The factory will only produce one product a certain way. That’s another thing, there can be a not-so-slight detachment from the product to the consumer. If you’re even a little astray from the norm, the sad truth is that you will not be able to drink T-Rex tea.

What if someone wants you to have those dinosaur ice cubes and, therefore, will not interact with you if you do not have them? What if we substitute the example of dinosaurs for, say, makeup? It’s an all-too-common thing, really. If someone does not have that commodity that the other wants, he or she might refuse to interact with him or her — even though that commodity is some arbitrary, detached commodity that most others have for no better reason than everyone else seems to have them.

Women and men sometimes feel like they need to be the same, wear the same makeup or have the same body structure to attract attention. In essence, that would make you a commodity. You don’t have to have or be a commodity in order to get someone’s attention. If you feel like you do, then you have become detached from that person before you have even started interacting.

Don’t drink T-Rex tea.

Don’t discard your identity.

Or become a commodity.

This is where my employer, the Riverview Center, comes in. Learn more at www.riverviewcenter.org or follow Josh Jasper’s blog at www.joshjasper.wordpress.com.

PS: That thing you use to talk to people — the one that is mass produced in factories by people who don’t care if it breaks/runs out of batteries/is too big or small for you. Psssst … it’s illegal to use in your car now.