Filthy Lucre, by Elayne Riggs
Being once again financially secure, with a job that will take less out of my paycheck for things like health insurance, and having a husband who’s also financially secure with his upcoming Big Project, I’ve been thinking a lot about money lately. Okay, I thought about it even more when I didn’t know where it would be coming from after my unemployment insurance ran out. Bu t now, my thoughts are turning to the strange notion of, as we used to call it in the ’90s back before Bush & co. ran the economy (and just about everything else) into the toilet, a budget surplus.
I was raised by two practical, fairly frugal people. We had our family holidays in upstate New York, we even took a trip once to Israel and Romania to see relatives, but for the most part we went to the shore or camp or just hung around the neighborhood when school let out. My parents were year-round wage earners, and encouraged the same sensibilities in me and my brothers. My mom was a school nurse for nine months out of the year and the de facto day camp nurse at Ashbrook Swim Club in the summers, where my brothers and I became counselors.
My first real paycheck at age 14 or so was from Ashbrook; I dimly remember getting a Social Security number so I could be paid. (Nowadays you’re assumed them at birth, aren’t you?) Because both Mom and Dad worked in an era when many families could afford to live on only one salary, I was never exposed to "mommy track" thinking, where I’d go to college to get my "M.R.S. degree." It was always assumed that, like my brothers, I’d go to university to acquire skills so I’d be able to support myself upon graduation. My brothers became accountants, like Dad. I was, um, er… well, I was an English major.
But after temping for about a year and a half I discovered, contrary to previous fears, that I was in no danger of losing my unique personality to become a cog in a faceless machine and that, in fact, I rather liked being a secretary. So that became my chosen profession. Yes yes, stereotypical female career, pink collar ghetto and all that — but hey, I enjoyed typing. I’d made pin money senior year of high school by running a buck-a-page typing service, back in the days before personal computers (and when dollar bills meant a bit more, as it was also in the days before plentiful ATMs). I figured I did about 40wpm in those days on a newfangled electric typewriter; later in my career that would jump to 80wpm on a Selectric and early PCs, and nowadays I regularly break 100. Hey, it’s my way of playing keyboard, since I never did have the reach to tackle the piano the way my grandmother and Dad’s cousins could. But I digress.
So I became a career secretary, and found I really liked helping people get things done, pushing paper until it disappeared and everything looked neat and tidy, playing with cool toys from computers to white-out (I go through Staples like a kid in a candy store), being the first in the office to learn new things, and just generally being indispensable and organized. And since just about any executive needs an “administrative assistant” it’s pretty good job security; I’m now on my third long-term job in 25+ years. So I find myself, at the moment, fairly flush.
Now, here’s the thing. When I have a personal budget surplus, about umpteen things run through my head. Right now it’s “we have to take care of stuff we’d been putting off buying for too many years.” But Robin and I are both comparison shoppers, and I have that aforementioned legacy of frugality as well. So I have some new $10 work shirts I picked up at Dress Barn, a new PC which cost less than my car insurance payment, and we’re investigating office chairs (which fall into the 5% of things we don’t want to buy online until we try them in person; I’m like that with clothing too) but the comfy $200 ones seem such a waste of money! This is what it’s like with me — I want new stuff but only if the old stuff is bad (my old PC couldn’t even handle Firefox 3 and I wound up not being able to post my ComicMix columns!) and needs to be disposed of or, even better, can be given away.
So after my immediate needs are taken care of (stupidly, the main thing I kept panicking about during my unemployment period was how long I’d be able to afford the shampoo and other toiletries I use, not to mention food… and I was never in danger of coming close to that poverty point), my charity impulse fights with my acquisitive nature and need for immediate self-gratification (ISG). It doesn’t take long before practicality rears its ugly head and wins. For instance, we can now theoretically afford to travel to San Diego for the convention later this month. I could theoretically borrow vacation days, beg Michael Davis to find us a hotel room, yadda yadda. But two of the four convention days are sold out, the last time we went to SDCC it wiped us out physically to the point where it took us a week to recover, we have a better time in NY anyway, and Robin has work. Still, the idea that I Can Go Anywhere Even Though I Won’t is mighty appealing.
And guilt-inducing. I already know I was never in danger of starving or becoming homeless even after my unemployment insurance ran out. I have a number of safety nets in place, I’ve never really lived a life without them. But I see what a mess President Kookoobananas and his bunch have made of this country’s economy, and I know damn well how many people are so much worse off than I am. So I’m constantly tempted to use some of my current windfall to help my friends and acquaintances who are down on their luck. When my blogging friends find themselves in dire straits and I’ve had some to spare, I’m off to PayPal like a shot to drop some in their kitty. And the more extra disposable income I have, the more inclined I am to want to give more, and not just to people I personally know.
Once I got my present job, I resubscribed to all the political magazines I never seem to have time to read (although that’s slowly changing now that I commute via public transit again) mainly because I want to support progressive media. I have a list of all the causes to which I’ve given money in the past, most which I haven’t supported in the last few years because, well, there’s also the selfish part of me that Wants Stuff.
In our hyper-capitalist society, where even patriotism is defined as going shopping, it’s hard to avoid the ISG impulse. I say I’m going to the Palisades Center because I really need work clothes and it’s a good one-stop shopping place with all the department stores, but I know that Robin’s going to have a browse in the Apple store and we’re inevitably headed up to the fourth level for conveyor-belt sushi. I go on Amazon to order grocery items that I can never seem to find locally, and while I’m there I can’t help but look around and wonder what else I want that I really, truly can live without. And now that I’m back in the comic book store weekly, whilst standing in the Wednesday afternoon queue I inevitably dart my eyes back and forth to Midtown Comics’ bookshelves wondering what else I can grab. It’s become a basic American character trait, for better or worse (I’m thinking “worse”).
All in all, I’ve reached the point in my life when my answer to the question “What would you do if a few thousand dollars suddenly fell in your lap?” is “pretty much what I’m doing now, except I’d sock most of it away in some bank.” I’m at a pretty happy place in my life, with an attentive and loving husband and a roof over my head in a nice neighborhood and two cats in the double-digits and a job filled with interesting people which I truly enjoy. I’m not the traveler I once was, mostly because I’ve grown fonder of Robin’s company than of being by myself, and when he’s unable to go anywhere I often feel “what’s the point?”, but also because I’m slowing down with age. Once I can stand for 45 minutes on a crowded subway without feeling pain — heck, once I can manage a brisk walk through a bit of Central Park on my lunch hour — then I’ll reconsider that hike through the Cotswolds or stroll down the Champs-Elysées. So if my basic material requirements are met, and I’ve got extra, my impulse is to spread some of it around to those in greater need, use some of it to slightly improve my creature comforts to a practical degree (i.e., replacing items that have seen better days), and save most of it Just In Case.
But first, you’ll have to excuse me whilst I head out to get conveyor-belt sushi.
Elayne Riggs blogs at Pen-Elayne on the Web, and is getting kind of sick of All-Star Game talk even as she types this three days beforehand. And she loooves baseball, so that’s saying something.
Congratulations on your corner of financial security, especially during these times when Security Exchanges have been exchanging security for insecurity.