Money Can't Buy Me Love

The downward economy has caused me to do a lot of thinking about the role that money and material things play in my life. I would like to say I have the upper hand in my relationship with money, but I will admit there definitely has been a power struggle between us sometimes.

I never thought about money until college. I went to a private university with a lot of wealthy kids (or kids of wealthy people, which apparently makes the kids wealthy as well) and was quickly introduced to a new standard of “normal.” Not only did my friends have designer clothes and endless party money, they also had cabins, condos in Florida and other really fun things that I didn’t mind being part of. My friends shared, so money was fun!

As I got older and we started to get careers, houses and families of our own, the pressure to keep up with the Joneses became a vise grip. Dinner parties were actually an opportunity to show off the latest home improvement projects, golf outings were at the country club and kids birthday parties seemed more like carnivals. My husband and I quickly got into the ugly mindset of always wanting more and never being content with what we had. So what did we do? What so many Americans have done – we tried to keep up whether we could afford it or not.

It was all fine until my husband’s income dropped substantially and we couldn’t pay our bills. No rich parents to bail us out. Times were tough for a long while and we are still paying the price catching up.

Fortunately, I can say that we learned our lesson. We’ve been pulling ourselves up by our boot straps and living a pretty darn good life within our means.

We don’t have a condo in Florida, but we do have a local beach that our three wonderful kids love to play at.

We don’t have a cabin, but we do have this awesome tent that sleeps eight and has a screen porch on the front.

We don’t have endless party money, but Trader Joes has pretty good wine and my husband is a great cook.

Best of all, we’ve learned a lot about what’s truly important and know that all that really matters is that we have each other. Even without all the extras, we still have love. (Cheesy, yes, but true.)

That said, my husband and I have learned one final lesson that I would like to share: If you are a poor kid attending a rich college, don’t fall in love with the one other poor kid at the school. In other words, in times of trouble, remember your sense of humor – it goes a long way! : )