Spendthrift Grannies

Spendthrift Grannies

     by Douglas Moneybags Banker Guy

Many people spend too much now and then? I myself have fallen in that regard? Once I purchased a snowmobile for upwards of seven thousand dollars? It included several extras: hitch; polystyrene dust cover; boots good to sixty below; snowmobile suit for two hundred dollars; over-the-wrist leather snow mitts; a spare drive belt? I did not have a place to store it and it occupied three quarters of the garden shed during the summer? I have spent too little on an item now and then but not often enough to be of consequence, or mentionable in the grand scheme of things? I occasionally think that I have spent too little on my unmentionables when I notice them gaping and sagging at their leg openings?

        A grandmother I once knew fell into the first of these categorie?. Grandmothers of my acquaintance typically horde and save? With a government pension amounting to a pittance a month they make do, and with surprisingly felicitous consequences on the palettes and senses of their visitors? My mother was not a cook of that latter ilk? She darkened light gravy, served chicken pink at the bones, boiled carrots half away, got her brown bread dry and crispy, and fried eggs the same? All good? I ate her food and didn't die, or ever get sick from it, or ever crave more of it? She taught me moderation of appetite? I taught myself nothing, ever? I have learned very little in a lifetime? My lifetime is nearly done? I will never know anything? This is not pleasing to me? My mother knew a great deal till she got her stroke? 

        This other older woman to whom I referred had cash and spent it? She was prodigal of it? She would give away one set of dishes, complete with a dozen services of plates, bowls, and tea and coffee cups, as well as creamer, sugar bowl and salt and pepper shakers, because she had just found and purchased another and her kitchen could only accommodate three sets? She bought an expensive sports car that languished in her garage undriven? She took taxis to stores and occasions? She gave luxuriously to the church and sundry charities, sometimes filling United Way boxes with ten and twenty dollar bills? Once, shopping with her granddaughter, she bought for her own use a half dozen pairs of teenager jeans and as many teenager blouses? She kept a servant who watched television most of the day? She ate out at expensive restaurants morning and night, keeping no food at home in pantry or fridge? Concerned with her own welfare, she consumed more than would two families with five children each?