By: Revanche

Shifts in money attitudes and life priorities

August 6, 2012

Subtle shifts have been happening in our lives over this past year and a half, underneath all the big stuff, and I’ve had a hell of a time processing the whole of it.

The part about us….

PiC and I spent a long time circling the table, not outright talking about the money issues in detail.  We didn’t make time, between the overworking, the travel, the other life stuff, but it seems we’ve still ended up on the same page, or at least in the same chapter.

We want the same things philosophically:  financial stability, the ability to care for ourselves and our family (whatever that family is), the freedom to live our lives with some choice and reasonable amenities.

We want the same things materially in the near future: a home where the Doggle can roam (he gets everything), a chance to improve my health so that we can make decisions about life a little less under duress, more time for him to dedicate to his hobbies.

And that’s good. The details aren’t always exactly aligned but that’s part of the process. And you know, partnerships.

The part about money …

There comes a time when Bag Lady Syndrome fades a little. It doesn’t go away entirely. But it fades. I look at our retirement accounts, and I see that they’re not piddling. I look across all our accounts and see that they’re not astounding but they’re a variety of vehicles and growing incrementally despite the fact that I know we are spending money every month, and not necessarily on things I always approve of.

Guess what? We can spend on necessities, save, support my dad, spend on non-necessities and it’s not the end of the world. Heaven forfend, we haven’t combined finances yet either. Shut the front door. We’re not hiding anything from each other, the small things are small things, the big things don’t happen in the dark, and we haven’t crashed our cash flow or our savings. Bit of a shocker, to be honest.

It’s like we just ran an experiment on ourselves. We can live in an universe where my heart doesn’t stop if I don’t know where every single penny goes, and he doesn’t spend like a Spender chafing under the restrictions of Revanche, CFO. Certainly it could use some fine-tuning but that’ll happen as it does.

I don’t know if it comes to a greater surprise to anyone than me that this is possible. Among other surprises:  He still tracks all of his expenses. I don’t anymore, I know when I spend cash and I note it somewhere but make it a point to nearly never do that, and just keep an eye on my CC statements.

I still don’t track our combined Net Worths yet.  That’s a Mount Midoriyama for another day.

The part about self care….

Everything under the subject of my health has been a slog this year. I would say a challenge but I rise up to challenges. This has been more of a death march.

I’m happy that I’m able to function, but that’s a loose use of the word function. There are indicators that even for me, even with my typical ability to power through pain, enough is enough.

We passed “enough” several weeks ago.

I worked with my doctor on a variety of treatments. It’s hugely time consuming (opportunity cost) and sometimes expensive, but if I’m going to make it through this period until I resolve the bigger underlying problems, I absolutely have to do it.

If I hadn’t made some of the choices I did earlier on with my career starting with leaving my first industry to go white collar, moving into the roles that I have, cultivating the position and support, setting up and training my team, etc., I suspect that I wouldn’t have the choice of taking that time out or spend my money without anyone balking or questioning me. So I’m grateful not to worry as much about my job security as other people would have to. This is a combination of work, luck, skill, and privilege (On privilege: Oil and Garlic and Cloud) The daily stress is bad enough without adding that particular type of stressor to the mix.

My FSA account has been getting worked over and when we got married I added more money to it. I’m certain it will be drained by the treatments before the year’s end.

This is new – taking care of myself and spending real time and money to do it. I’ve been living with this pain since long before I’ve taken care of my family.  For the first time, not that I don’t still have responsibilities and people depending on me, but for the first time, my health is finally a real priority for me and not just an obstacle to get past.

I suspect it was because I never wanted it to define my life, to limit my life or to be the focus, particularly because I dealt with ignorant doctors for umpteen years who dismissed the problem as “all in your head” and refused to diagnose it, leaving me with no answers and no possible solutions. But by ignoring it, that’s still exactly what the health issues became. Now, it’s time to really deal with it as best I can.

It’s no coincidence that this is a priority now. Without the Iron Fist Grip on the finances loosening, survival would have remained the top priority, not thriving.

Nicole and Maggie and feMOMhist both talked about this.

The part about having and doing nice things ….  

Lots of my old habits still hold: I still don’t go out to eat, especially alone, making do w/freezer or pantry. I only buy strictly utilitarian clothes. I buy books if I have Amazon credits. I occupy free time by working on projects that make me happy instead of going out (and spending).  These aren’t deprivations – these are habits I keep because they make me happy or not unhappy.  But I can spend a little now, and so I will.

The happiness value of PiC buying things on sale from his favorite shops or my shipping a package of Cheer Ye Up goodies to a friend cost about the same. They also don’t happen every day or week, so they add up slowly.

We will eat out at our local ethnic restaurants together when we’re too tired or pressed for time to cook. The food’s good and meals will come under $25 for two.  That’s a nice thing we can do for ourselves.

One or the other of us can buy a semi-big ticket item once in a while as well. He was of the belief that it was never a problem if it was a need (trumping cash flow) while I believed it was always a problem regardless of the need (cash flow trumps). We’re in agreement now: it’s ok for it to be a sometimes thing.

Packing at the last minute for work travel earlier this year, I realized something seemingly trivial but rather embarrassing. I didn’t have any decent handbag in good condition that could double as a lightweight travel bag.

It’s just not something I think about – I use whatever comes to hand, lightweight totes or old purses, on personal travel because I don’t need nice stuff. It’s going to get tossed around in a car, a plane, a train, or wherever else I’m going.  Nice stuff is for the aspirational me.  Or so I had decided, dismissively.

But, in business as in most formal settings, one shouldn’t show up unkempt if you’re meant to be taken seriously. Well, unless you’re the eccentric genius or much-lauded brilliant whosifer in which case you could have half a head of hair the wrong way on and it wouldn’t much matter. That is not me.

So when I showed up to that conference, with fraying bag handles on a decades-old bag that I didn’t notice until I got there?  It was like showing up to a formal interview with a hole in my shirt. Igh! That bag was tucked right under the table with a silent promise to take care of it when I got home.

I don’t call consumer goods “investments”, but having a good set of clean, crisp clothing and a set of decent accessories to go with it is, I will ‘fess up, worth something. I’d come around on the clothing thing a while ago, but had a blind spot when it came to the accessories, particularly the handbag thing. It’s one of those things that is invisible until you bring an eyesore.  (As it turns out, I should have learned my lesson about three years ago.)

I returned, hangdog on the matter, and grumpy that I had to find something *just right*.  Only complicated the search by insisting it had to cost under $80.

PiC endured my online shopping plaints for a week, helped searched for bags, then told me to shut up and raise my price point. No, he was nicer about it. But even I was sick of the whole thing by then. It took nearly a month but I ended up spending – I wasn’t going to say but, this is still a finance blog – $400.  I bought gift cards at a discount first but it was still a hefty whack.

I would probably have had an mini-aneurysm over that out of context except:

I haven’t purchased a purse in 4 years.
I won’t buy another one for probably at least another 5-7 years.
It’s a very sturdy, lightweight bag from Nordstrom so, should there be any quality issues I won’t have any issues returning it.

The most important point, though, is that I didn’t need to stress about this relatively high-ticket purchase – it came out of my cash flow and didn’t impact anything.

Even though it wasn’t planned for, it was within my means because I’ve not been spending much of my disposable income.  So once I committed, and determined that it would suit the purpose, it was fine.

The part where I realize …. 

We are in wealth nurturing mode. At some point, even I stopped needing to stay in survival gear. For twelve years, I drove in multiple gears: saving, maintaining survival gear, and investing, all simultaneously for various parts of the family.  It comes as a surprise that maintaining frugality is, for the moment, a practiced preference and habit, not a need.

We can afford to invest in my health, speculate a little about our future, and think about trying new things rather than just doubling down if we’re willing to stretch ourselves in different directions.

It’s time to start evaluating those options, those roads I didn’t even peer down once upon a midnight sky, because the only road I ever set my feet down was the one I was sure would keep my family under a roof with food on the table.  It’s time to marshal the resources and start dreaming. For the first time, maybe.

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