If you’re like me, you grew up hoping that your family had money. In fact, lots of money.
Enough money to buy new clothes whenever you want, and take exotic vacations instead of riding in the back of a station wagon to Oklahoma for your dad’s job.
(surprisingly) enough money to own a swanky bar with a color TV and cocktail glasses. And you can play squash.
Today, our family might be classified as working poor, but as a girl I read books about wealthy families and knew what I wanted in life: a squash court, for example.
Forget tennis. Rich people played squash, at least according to my favorite writers. I didn’t really know how to play the game. I knew it had nothing to do with zucchinis, which was a shame, because I had loads of zucchinis in my garden. I just knew it was a rich person’s sport.
Then there were the phones. The name says it all: “Princesses.” Princesses had pastel colored extensions in their bedrooms, which normal people don’t have.
We had one olive green phone in our house, next to the living room where my parents sat after dinner. If I wanted to have a private conversation, I had to go into the coat closet and close the door. Luckily, the phone had a long cord.
Some of you don’t know what I’m talking about because you grew up with that greatest invention, the cell phone. No cords, no closets, and more privacy than your parents could ever want. You carry a space-age communications device in your pocket and don’t understand how miraculous this all is. But I do.
For many years I entertained the dream of being rich, but then I actually ended up working for rich people. In my early twenties, I worked for an entertainment company in Beverly Hills that handled the money of famous musicians, bands, actors and other celebrities.
I had just moved to Southern California and was living on a bag of russet potatoes and iced tea because it was all I could afford. Every day in my new job, when I was asked to deliver $1,000 to a client playing poker or wrote monthly pay checks to 13 housekeepers living in different clients’ homes around the world, I would wonder, “Who are these people and why do they have so much money?”
But as I got used to this strange environment, I realized that things weren’t what they seemed: these people had more money than they knew what to do with, and so they had hired my boss to invest the money for them.
However, very few people actually seemed happy, and no one seemed to appreciate the luxuries that most of us would strive to have. I realized that money, once you have it in large quantities, means nothing.
And new worries arose: the fear of losing his savings and having to go back to living like a peasant, the genuineness of his new friends, how to occupy his time now that he no longer had to work.
I was shocked to realize how lucky I was to have grown up in a family that didn’t have much money.
I knew that even if I lost my job, I would always have enough income to survive. How to save money. How to live off baked potatoes.
I also knew that possessions alone would not be enough. Everyone needs a minimum of things, but more than that becomes unsatisfying after a while. Sure, you need a reliable car here (my old Toyota runs just as well as a Rolls Royce), a place to live, and enough food. The rest is all up to negotiation.
I can fix things. I can’t fix a dryer. But if my pants rip, I can fix them because I learned how to sew. My kids think this is a weird, magical skill, but I explain to them that they don’t need to throw things away. You’d be surprised how many things you can fix with glue, duct tape, and thread.
I know how to cook. Yes, I like eating out. I don’t mind washing dishes. But I can also make good food at home. I learned how to cook by watching “Chopped” on TV. I recommend it.
I can take care of myself and the house. I learned how to clean and work hard from a young age. Now that I’m disabled, a housekeeper comes and helps me on Fridays. But when my kids were little, they would bossily tell me, “You don’t have to clean your room tomorrow because Dora is coming,” so I took action. Dora stopped cleaning the kids’ rooms. And that was it. They had to learn to keep their own space clean. (They even washed their own clothes.)
Looking back, I realize my parents did me a favor: taught me how to survive on a shoestring income. I wouldn’t complain if I won the lottery. I’m not stupid. But if I didn’t, I’d still be happy. (And, God, if you’re listening, I’m kidding. I don’t win the lottery. Thank you.)
First published: August 21, 2024, 7:00 AM
