The short story "Inventory/ The Token" took on such a serious subject and made it seem so casual and ordinary. The entire adoption system seems like a sick and twisted game. The wet nurses were paid a "general annual bonus" for keeping the children that they were responsible for alive, as if these nurses were playing a game to keep them alive only because of the reward they would receive. The upper class people of London in the 1740's turned unwanted children into a game by hosting a lottery event where the mothers who didn't want their children would pick a ball that chose the fate of their child. Even though forms of birth control and medical treatments hadn't been discovered its hard to believe that so many women would be so eager to give up their own living specimen.
With all other things not in consideration I thought the tracking system was really interesting. It gives us insight on how a mother could reclaim their child before things such as blood tests and social security numbers existed. Since a "token" was all a mother had to reclaim her children it seems that it brings great value to something that could be so simple. Since the token seems to be the only way for a mother to find her child it leads me to believe that If the mother were to loose the token there would be no other way for her to someday reclaim her child. This seems unfathomable to me that such great value can be placed on one simple thing.
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