Behind the Ironic Column

One of the amusing things I’ve noticed about all this clearing out of old records is that my spending habits are remarkably consistent.  And I used to use checks for almost everything in those days so it’s pretty clear where my money went.  These days of course I’d have to have the debit card statements and those are only online, so this kind of retrospection won’t occur.  I’m no Luddite by any means but somehow holding a cancelled check in my hand is much more evocative than looking at a long scrolling list of payments on my computer screen.  On the good side of the ledger, I won’t be worrying about scraps of paper and clearing out boxes.  Online storage brings its own headaches and disasters but paper dust isn’t one of them.

Most of my purchases seem to have been at grocery stores – food taking up a goodly percentage of anyone’s income and especially those of us in the lower wage brackets.  The mortgage wasn’t paid out of that same bank account but there are the usual expenses for car travel – probably not as much as some people because I’ve almost always used public transportation.  And the utility payments that no one escapes.  And haircuts.  I’m not even going to  think for an instant about how much money I’ve spent on having short hair – if I’d let it grow out, that money would have been available for something else.  I did once have long hair – long enough to put up in one of those traditional librarian’s bun arrangements.  There are a few pictures of me like that but no one I know now would recognize me.  I’m not even sure I would recognize myself. 

There are purchases for clothes and household items, of course.  But not nearly as many as one might think.  Certainly not nearly as many as my friends who used to hang out at the mall every weekend.  I don’t go to malls much and, when I do, I end up at the bookstore.  Of course, most of those expenses would have appeared on charge card statements – not as individual checks. 

The discretionary spending runs to the same kind of places it does now – books (both book clubs and regular stores), museums and libraries, zoos and birding groups, gardens and natural history organizations.  I haven’t counted up how many friends of the library or friends of the zoo or friends of the garden organizations I’ve belonged to over the years (and in many cases still do belong to even though I don’t live near them any more).   But, judging by the number of checks, the totals of all those would come to a substantial amount.  There are donations to other charities and such as well, but they don’t show up every year. 

If I examined my bank statements for recent years (even in the charmless online versions) I’d expect to see the same kinds of expenses and the same kinds of places receiving the bulk of my expenditures.  In this case, I believe I am not under Emerson’s condemnation of “foolish consistency” but simply continuing to spend my money on the material goods and organizations that have meaning for me. 

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