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The other night I was having a conversation with ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
tyrsalvia and I mentioned how when I randomly splurged last November and bought a ticket for enotsola to come out here for Thanksgiving, a trip which had not been previously planned (in general there's a sort of schedule we stick to, based on when kin gathers and holidays are and fairly splitting the time in between these). It was bought only about two weeks in advance, which yes, that's "on a whim", compared to the month or so in advance that I usually do. It is largely a cost consideration (which is the crux of this entry): the closer you get to the flight date, the more expensive the ticket becomes.
Now, it certainly makes sense to me to save money where possible, thus if I know dates a month ahead, I may as well buy the ticket and save myself a couple hundred dollars. No reason to spend it if I don't have to. But in the case of the random "yeah! let's do it", what troubled me was that when I did it, I felt guilty. "You're not supposed to make expensive purchases on a whim," said the voice. "It's wrong." Not "unwise", or "a bad thing to get into the habit of", which it certainly would be, even if I could technically afford it by looking at my bank account. Morally wrong somehow.
I know this comes mainly from my father, with a contribution from the "reaction against turning into my mother" department. While my mother is not stupid about money, she likes to spend it if she has it, past what I consider the point of being reasonable, making assumptions about the continuance of income that you can't really make, especially these days. My father is utterly the opposite; he saves everything he possibly can, eschewing even minor "fun" purchases so that he will have insurance against the future. This in turn is inherited from his own family situation, where his own father had a gambling problem and at the age of about 20 he was practically supporting his parents. He doesn't want to wind up without money period, and he definitely doesn't want to have to take any from me.
This is all very reasonable. As I said, it makes sense to me to save a good deal of money. Then, if you need it for something, you have it, and can simply afford whatever it is you need without wondering if you'll be able to get it or whether you will be able to eat for the next month. This seems especially important in the case of saving for the possibilty of needing expensive medical care or car repair (non-insurance kinds of stuff), or suppose you suddenly needed money to retain a lawyer for something; one never knows.
But there comes a point when it gets silly. More may be better in the savings department but to feel it is bad to spend some of it now and again doesn't seem right to me. Last night I decided to oppose this internal demon by randomly spending some money on things that I didn't exactly need, but could afford, and had wanted. It probably added up to a couple hundred dollars. And on each one I was getting these whispers, "what are you doing? silly girl! what purpose is this going to serve? you're just spending money that you shouldn't be! this money wasn't supposed to be spent on anything yet! you're just being wasteful!" It was such a weird feeling.
I don't think I have any conclusion to this, just recording the experience. I'm probably going to get a lot more jokes about my having a shipping and receiving department in my room when the packages start coming. :-/
tyrsalvia and I mentioned how when I randomly splurged last November and bought a ticket for enotsola to come out here for Thanksgiving, a trip which had not been previously planned (in general there's a sort of schedule we stick to, based on when kin gathers and holidays are and fairly splitting the time in between these). It was bought only about two weeks in advance, which yes, that's "on a whim", compared to the month or so in advance that I usually do. It is largely a cost consideration (which is the crux of this entry): the closer you get to the flight date, the more expensive the ticket becomes. Now, it certainly makes sense to me to save money where possible, thus if I know dates a month ahead, I may as well buy the ticket and save myself a couple hundred dollars. No reason to spend it if I don't have to. But in the case of the random "yeah! let's do it", what troubled me was that when I did it, I felt guilty. "You're not supposed to make expensive purchases on a whim," said the voice. "It's wrong." Not "unwise", or "a bad thing to get into the habit of", which it certainly would be, even if I could technically afford it by looking at my bank account. Morally wrong somehow.
I know this comes mainly from my father, with a contribution from the "reaction against turning into my mother" department. While my mother is not stupid about money, she likes to spend it if she has it, past what I consider the point of being reasonable, making assumptions about the continuance of income that you can't really make, especially these days. My father is utterly the opposite; he saves everything he possibly can, eschewing even minor "fun" purchases so that he will have insurance against the future. This in turn is inherited from his own family situation, where his own father had a gambling problem and at the age of about 20 he was practically supporting his parents. He doesn't want to wind up without money period, and he definitely doesn't want to have to take any from me.
This is all very reasonable. As I said, it makes sense to me to save a good deal of money. Then, if you need it for something, you have it, and can simply afford whatever it is you need without wondering if you'll be able to get it or whether you will be able to eat for the next month. This seems especially important in the case of saving for the possibilty of needing expensive medical care or car repair (non-insurance kinds of stuff), or suppose you suddenly needed money to retain a lawyer for something; one never knows.
But there comes a point when it gets silly. More may be better in the savings department but to feel it is bad to spend some of it now and again doesn't seem right to me. Last night I decided to oppose this internal demon by randomly spending some money on things that I didn't exactly need, but could afford, and had wanted. It probably added up to a couple hundred dollars. And on each one I was getting these whispers, "what are you doing? silly girl! what purpose is this going to serve? you're just spending money that you shouldn't be! this money wasn't supposed to be spent on anything yet! you're just being wasteful!" It was such a weird feeling.
I don't think I have any conclusion to this, just recording the experience. I'm probably going to get a lot more jokes about my having a shipping and receiving department in my room when the packages start coming. :-/
