Getting and Spending

"Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers."
During the short time I was a TV pitchman on the QVC shopping channel, that sentiment from Wordsworth kept resonating in my mind: the futility of getting and spending. And I think the viewers heard it telepathically because I certainly was not a very successful peddler of gee-gaws and jimcracks.
Lois was always the cheery one at Christmas, buying gifts for everyone. I was the Scrooge. "Why do we need to buy things for people that they don't really need with money we don't really have?"
We are all now in the process of looking at what's really important. Not just us but the entire world. Awesome thought. Scary thought.
A few years ago, I spent some time with a family in Poland and I was struck by the family connection. The Hidjik family shared a car with their neighbor. Shared a car! Can you believe it? It was parked in a garage a block away and they had to WALK to get to it.
Astounding.
I saw families on Sunday with picnic baskets walking down to the river bottom for a Sunday lunch together. TOGETHER! Caramba!
A few things we can do without and still have healthy, happy lives:
- Cable TV. Instead of paying $100-plus a month, put up an antenna. It's free! Poor people have been doing that for years. Back when I was on TV, I was always recognized more in the poor neighborhoods. The rich folks didn't watch that much free TV and they didn't know me from Adam's house cat.
- High-speed internet. Internet service providers have been sticking it to us for another $100 a month. They may magically find a way to do the same thing cheaper.
- Cosmetic surgery. Let nature take its course!
- A new car. It's a lot cheaper to maintain the old one. And with cars easily getting 100,000 miles, another 100,000 isn't out of the question. Ought to be a boom time for garage mechanics. But a bust time for manufacturers.
- Education. Wouldn't it be lovely to see our children get educated? Be able to read? Diagram a sentence? Know the capitals of the United States? We're spending billions on things having little to do with education. ESL. Special ed. Piffle! What about the basics? The basics may be all we can afford. And that ain't bad.
- Extras on cell phones. What about actually speaking to people? I wouldn't see cell phones going away but I'd sure see us cutting back on some of the frills.
- Big houses. Those McMansions out in the suburbs. What's going to happen to them when their owners have to move out and into small apartments? Believe me, life WILL go on.
- When we take European vacations, stay in the room with a bathroom down the hall. It won't kill you. I've been doing it for years.
- Cook at home instead of eating out or heating up frozen dinners.
- Drink water out of the faucet. The water is safe. This is not a third-world country!
We've got our "wants" and "needs" sort of scrambled together.
I think some unscrambling is ahead.
My calendar has a German sentence for each day. Today's is, "Das ist Wahnsinn." Which translates as, "This is insanity."
Maybe not. Maybe this is sanity. We just didn't expect it to look like this.
Rejoice!