Learning the Art of Thrift
It helps to have lived in Vietnam and the Congo. I mean, I've seen poor, really poor. People sleeping in shifts on the dirt floors of scrap-metal shacks. Rice or manioc as the only food at a meal, and everyone thankful to have even that. Students using every square inch, front and back, of a piece of paper, using pencils down to a nub. Water being hauled home in jerry cans from distant pumps.
So when the US economy--and my household income--hit the wall, the personal situation didn't seem as dire to me as it might have. I'm worried sick about the people who are losing their jobs and their houses, but me? I've got work I love, that I can't be fired from because it's my shop, and I'm proud to keep doing the work even without a paycheck. I've got a small, blessed safety net--a Social Security check that means I can always buy groceries. There are flannel sheets and a down quilt on my comfortable bed, a bed protected by a solid, almost-paid-for roof and walls. When I turn on the taps, I get clean, sweet well water.
Compared to the Vietnamese and Congolese I remember so vividly, I am, even in 2009, a person of stunning wealth. I remind myself of that when I'm tempted to feel deprived because I can't afford tickets for the symphony or a trip home to New York.
There's also a small Thank Heaven that every spare buck for years has gone into our mortgage, not the market, and not the mall. When Alan Greenspan urged home-buyers to use the equity in their houses to go shopping, I was outraged. When George Bush's rallying call to the nation after 9/11 was, Go shopping, I was ashamed that an American President could be so shallow. We're better than that. Our new President knows that about us. And we need to prove it now.
One way we deal with this crisis is to learn the art of thrift--and that ain't a bad thing. There can be real satisfaction for the previously privileged in meeting this challenge. How do you make cheap ingredients into delicious meals? Can we entertain each other instead of going to concerts? Let's find a shoe-repair shop to fix this broken heel. Is there somebody who can make the broken vacuum work again?
One form of economizing had me particularly worried. Gift-giving has always been a big pleasure for me and now it's a major expense that's been cut from the budget. So I announced to friends and family that from now on I'd be shopping the house for something they might love. Surely among the hundreds of books, pictures and mementos here, there would be something they might treasure.
First time putting that plan into effect: a January birthday for an 11-year-old granddaughter. I found a small hand-carved box on a shelf, put in a pair of tiny earrings my mother once gave me, and mailed them off to her. On her birthday, the phone rang and her excited voice was asking, "Really, Great Grandma gave them to you?" I'd never gotten a thank-you call from her before--my son emailed that she was showing the earrings to all her birthday guests, telling them the story behind the little gold flowers. Not a bad thing atall.
There are rough times ahead, and the Prime Directive is to help each other through. But learning the art of thrift can get us through the small stuff. And so much of it is, in the big picture, small stuff.
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One has only to recall the news coverage of the store clerk trampled to death in the Thanksgiving store stampede to assume that stampedes occur with alarming regularity, just not with fatal results. Certainly a key part of the nation's financial crisis is the aggregate result of people living beyond their means via massive credit card debt. Why do they do it? Because they gotta have the stuff that's advertised incessantly.
Ann's prescription to give some of her belongings away as gifts instead of hunting the retail world is very sound. And safer!
We've lost any sense of gratitude for the unbelievable blessings in our lives ..... and lost the sense of what underlies true happiness: connection/community, peace, spiritual fulfillment..... Time to re-awaken the deeper values that underlie what it means to be truly human ..... Perhaps this apparent "crisis" is our opportunity to re-orient towards true humanity..... Thanks, Ann !
Great story, Ann, and my, how it reinforces my sense that we're sisters separated at birth. See, I JUST FOUND IN MY DRAWER the perfect pair of earrings for. . .my about-to-be-11 granddaughter, and then I found a beautiful little box, and. . .then I read your good article.
But I have always been poorish, and to this day the diamond earrings I gave my daughter, mother of the above granddaughter, earrings which are visible in the wedding daguerreotype of my own great-grandmother, are my daughter's "best present ever." And she wears them almost every day, so I get to see them more than when they were in the safety deposit box, that's for sure!
--Clarinda
Ann Medlock brings rare good common sense to the general sense of panic surrounding the current economic downturn. In times of worry, doubt and fear, this is the type of voice we need to listen to: clear, well-grounded, practical, creative. I was a Peace Corps Volunteer for 2 years in Guatemala and experienced the poverty that Ann speaks about, so I know that electric lights or a hot shower are a luxury and not a birthright. Thank you, Ann, for reminding us all of the great good fortune we enjoy (and take for granted) daily--and helping us to see that scarcity may just be the answer that turns us back to ourselves, our family and our connection to our communities.
Ann, I finally got to this article! It all makes perfect sense to me. As a girl my mom and I only "shopped" for clothes twice a year and I don't think it was enough to salvage an economy. It has become a sad myth that our country requires mindless shopping in order to thrive. As you point out, the best treasures are right under our noses. I'm delighted the earrings were such a hit. Children know a real gift when they see one! Love you!
I'm not an economist and I still have nightmares from the macro economic equations learned in business school depicting the broad implications of a 1 cent change in the NYC subway rate; but haven't we done enough already? U.S. citizen have been asked to carry the weight of the global economy - as world consumers - and at our own peril. Our quality of life has suffered from our excessive consumerism. Isn't it time that citizens of another country stepped in to deliver the mass consumerism necessary to fuel the global economy? Why can't our government support our need to fill our minds and bank accounts with memories and peace of mind instead of cramming our houses and landfills with junk we don't need?
This is wonderful down-to-earth good sense! It brings on a wave of happy memories of good times when our kids were little -- our son was just about entirely dressed by Ann "shopping the house" to hand on her son David's clothes. They are just about the only clothes Jay ever cared about. He cared because he felt special wearing big boy David's outfits. Perhaps he subconsciously also felt the caring spirit that handed them on.
This week I'll be with farm workers in Nicaragua and Honduras -- not as fearful a life as in the Congo or any place at war, but a pungent reminder to treasure the basics we take for granted except in those transforming moments when we hear a clear voice like Ann's. She's an insightful soul
who lives her values. Thanks!
I definitely need to take a page out of your book. I've always been terrible at being thrifty. I really like the shopping in the house idea though! Goodness knows I've got enough stuff in my room that some of it could make good gifts. Thanks for getting me thinking about this. Yet another well-written, thoughtful post.
Thanks, Ann. I particularly like the idea of shopping the house for gifts. No one in our household is a mall-addict, so our most significant change has been to look at ways to cut back the grocery bill, which is considerable with teenaged boys in the house. Lots of soups and stews these days.
lizrich151 is right--the economy HAS become addicted to a steady supply of discretionary consumer spending, and economic growth has become dependent on that spending increasing. As with any addiction, the cure looks to be painful, and it requires a major change in the alignment of our values fueled by the will and determination to live differently.
We're calling them Big-pot meals. This weekend it was ham hocks with black eyed peas and homemade corn bread. Very cheap and tasty way to fill up growing boys.
Important points. Thanks, Ann. Perhaps one more side effect of our current economic environment is Americans may be motivated to reclaim their roles as "citizens" instead of mere "consumers."
Correct point, I think, a good citizen weighs generosity and prudence as of greater value than consumption and gives consideration to consumption as to whether it fills a need or fulfills the lesser value of desire. The difference is between a life style of gratitude and one of mindless acquisition. It is also the difference between a consideration of pure personal gain or mindful participation in the common good.
The dignity of "citizen" instead of the triviality and negativity of "consumer"--one of the points a lot of us keep making--what disrespect there is in referring to us as consumers--it's part of manipulating us out of the loop where serious decisions are made about the nation--our only role is to go buy stuff. It's also part of conflating the free market with true democracy. Don't get me started!
I never lived in Vietnam or the Congo or overseas, but courtesy of the US Navy and as a traveler I have seen extreme poverty across the world, in Mexico, Panama, pre-Castro Cuba, China, Macau and places you maybe wouldn’t expect it like the back alleys of Japan, Israel, France, Germany, England and the US (would you believe Washington DC?) as well. And it never ceases to move me. By comparison, we Americans have it good, even in DC, but we don’t seem to know it.
Having said that, a lot of Americans are in a new world of hurt, some of their own doing and some not. But for way too long, we have been a nation of conspicuous consumption. The 80’s and 90’s were great and I admit to being swept along with those times. However, it’s easy to remember growing up in the late 30’s and 40’s in a two-earner, middle-class household in the eastern US where we practiced thrift as a matter of course.
Ann is right on. There are rough times ahead, comparatively, and it is imperative that we start acting as a community by understanding that the well-being of one is the well-being of all. Adjusting to this will be no easy task given our recent history, but it is the responsibility of all of us to adjust. Being thrifty as a part of it “ain’t a bad thing”. Who knows? We may even get to like it!
The old Navy recruiting slogan sure proved out for you--Join the Navy and See the World. It's invaluable--every young person should get the chance, one way or another, to see beyond our borders. It's the deepest kind of education.
I love this woman! It helps that I see here often enough. We also share a common place where thrift shopping produces some real treasures. And when I shop there, they put some of that money back into a garden that supplies their food bank and is cared for by students in the local schools. And as others have mentioned, honing back into our own lives and connecting there is the real treasure that I hope is emerging in our country.
The art of thrift vs. the art of being wasteful? isn't it true that being resourcefull is stemming from ingenuity?
Dear Annie,
A provocative piece indeed --thank you!
Yes indeed --good times are coming! Think about it: no more endless shopping for stuff; no more Patriotic Mall Duty; no more TV Couch Duty; no more stuck-in-traffic Duty . Instead we will turn off the TV, read more books (especially Small Press books), become more interesting, have more conversations. We will ride our green bicycles; we will grow our green gardens. We will pursue --and this time maybe even catch-- some of that much-vaunted Happiness.
I love that Arabic proverb: "Riches have disclosed in your character the bad qualities concealed by your poverty." It has such resonances for our time, don't you think? I reject the word "depression". Look on the bright side, I say : we are all about to become...more likeable. At least...apparently.
And does the Stone Street small press have a slim volume of Arabic proverbs?
Dear Annie: Since you asked, yes, as it happens, The Stone Street Press does publish "A Collection of Arabic Proverbs'": it was my "post 9.11" contribution to understanding the Arabic-Islamic world, and includes a "post 9.11" essay. I had come across Ambrose Bierce's trenchant "War is God's way of teaching Americans geography" and thought that it resonated with my sentiments.
Ann, Good reminder for anyone who can't print money, i.e., all of us except Mr. Obama. For everyone but him, economics is the law of the household, spending less than we earn. The problem is: easy to borrow, hard to repay.
Ann. Well stated and important reminder. Thank you.
Ann, I love the image of you "shopping the house"and pulling a book from a case or looking at some little treasure with a particular person in mind. I once lived in a poor part of Mexico and have the same sense of the "stunning wealth" most of us in America enjoy. I think we will find that this recession and the one step back we're taking has actually moved us two steps forward in our ability to creatively take care of ourselves and others.
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