Hanging out with rich people

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

I’ve been working on a carpentry job for a new client recently. He’s a nice guy, and he does some woodwork on his own for fun. So we’ve been pretty much working together on this, and also have hung out some.

This guy has money. Lots of money. MUCH money.

For me, the job we’re doing is big bucks. He never bats an eye at a bill and pays immediately. He always picks up the check when we eat while on the job.

Then yesterday I went to his home for the first time to pick him up. It was an entirely different world. I’m an apartment dweller, so when I pulled into his five-building COMPOUND I was amazed. It was like going to a park. Then (on the clock, mind you) he took me on an hour-long tour of the grounds.

Two pools, stable, horses, and other expensive “toys”, as he called them. Any one of those toys would represent the ultimate for me, and take concerted effort to raise the money. His house and car were immaculate. Best of everything, wall to wall.

It was an interesting experience for me to be surrounded by this grandeur. At every turn I saw something that probably cost more than I make in a year.

I definitely felt envy, but in a mild way. This gentleman works very hard at a business he built, and is a very nice guy. While I’d love to have that money, I’m not the sort that rises every day in relentless pursuit of it. I wouldn’t want to trade my free time and interests for a life where I had no time for them.

I was also keenly aware that every expensive object created responsibility, and worry. Even if I had the money, I doubt I would have much “stuff”. Too much stuff feels confining to me. But I did feel a lot of envy over the vast spaces. Huge lawns, a pond, some forest.

Today was a visit through the looking glass. It was nice visit, but I must admit that I’m not prepared to go the lengths my client has to achieve his lifestyle. I think I’m one of many (probably most) who would like to HAVE a lot of money, but aren’t prepared to make the necessary sacrifices. And that’s fine. I have what I’ve chosen, and I enjoy it.

But it would be cool to have my own forest…

2

Wait, wait.

Is that, um, a story about, like, Jesus and stuff?

3

See? All rich people aren’t jerks and losers who just “got lucky” :wink: There is a lesson here, somewhere… I’m glad you had a positive experience.

4

I get you. I work to pay the bills, and sometimes worry about having month left after the money’s run out. But I am not driven by the almighty dollar, and prefer my life lived honestly to The Rich Life. (Not that such a life can’t be lived honestly as well. It’s just not mine.)

My boyfriend, however, comes from a silver-spoon community, and thinks nothing of taking me to the nearest resort town (Whistler, in our case) for the weekend, and paying for everything. He has admitted to me that he intends to work like crazy now, while he has his youth, strength and stamina, so that he can retire at 35 (or maybe 40). He and all his friends have toys worth more than my annual salary, and yet …

Nicer people you will not meet. It’s almost as if, having proven their worth according to their own yardsticks, they have nothing to prove to anyone else. That, I’m jealous of.

5

I’d like to have the money that some wealthy people I know waste in a year. Hell, I’d be happy with the cash they spent getting their dogs groomed.

All the rich people I know, though, work for it. Some of them, though, are SO out of touch with reality (the realistic ones are the ones who worked their way up from poverty).

I don’t think I’d ever want to get so rich that I forget what it’s like to live from paycheck to paycheck, or not understand that when the average person says “I’m broke” they really mean “I have no money,” and not “I have to go to the bank and withdraw some more money out of my limitless bank account, as I have no cash on me at present.”

Does that make any sense?

6

Interestingly, he sometimes speaks sadly of his daughter because she grew up in such a way that she didn’t learn what it was to do without. He says she expects people to do things for her, and has a poor work ethic.

People like that piss me off. However, folks like her father I can live with easily. Besides, he says he usually votes Democrat!

7

Or, more likely, they can relax because they don’t have to deal with the constant daily stress of struggling to survive. It’s easy to be nice when the biggest worries that afflict most people are removed for you personally.
This may not necessarily apply to those who worked their way up though.

8

My best friend in the first college I attended (who founded the Student Democrats chapter there) always used to say a rich Democrat was one whose employees hadn’t unionized.

9

I may not have much money, but I’m one of the richest people on earth.

I literally have everything I want, though, admitttedly, I don’t want much. I have plenty of food in my cupboard, a pile of new books waiting to be read, a car that gets me from point A to point B, a soft bed and cable TV. What more could I possibly need?

For me, true wealth is being happy with what you have. Some folks are consumed with striving constantly for more, and no matter what they have, it’s never enough. Being truly blessed in life is being happy with your lot.

10

Have you (the OP) ever read The Great Gatsby?

11

I’ve got several close family members (in the generation older than mine) who were born with nothing, worked their tails off, and now have astonishing wealth. They don’t own their own forests, but probably could if they wanted to.

And they are so much fun! There’s not a pretentious bone in their bodies, and they fully enjoy their money. They buy ultralight aircraft and computer-controlled telescopes and fabulous toys like that, and I go visit them and we hang out and drink wine that’s WAY out of my price range and shoot pool and go out on the boat and just generally have a ball.

I have to admit that I used to have an instinctive prejudice against the rich, but now that I actually know some of them, I have decided that I would like to be rich too.

:smiley:

12

I have a friend who found out about 10 years ago that her parents are fairly wealthy, in that she will inherit a few million dollars from them someday. They were busy “making it” while she was growing up, and I guess they finally hit the mother lode after she’d left home. Thing is, these are the same parents who used to beat the crap out of her when she was a child. Of course they minimize it now. What’s really cool is my friend has managed to do very well for herself, on her own; she has made enough money through her own hard work that if she managed carefully and chose well, I don’t think she’d ever have to work again.

I don’t know what the moral of the story is.

I have no money but I’m really happy anyway because I have what I need and I love what I do.

13

I’m from Carmel, which is always full of rich people, they are usually bored, but they sure look nice, esp the women. Ya know, all that time at the salon.

Usually the hub brags to his wife how much money they have, until she seems him in court, when it’s the other way around.

14

I’ve never met any rich people (at least, when knowing that they’re rich). I’ve often wondered about what being rich would be like…

15

Being rich is the same as being poor, but with more choices. In other words, money can’t buy you happiness but it does give you more options to find ways to be happy.

16

I’m not rich and am never going to be rich, dammit, but I grew up in an Old-Money Neighborhood and got used to hob-nobbing wit’ da swells. As long as you don’t take it seriously, it’s lots of fun and yes, very rich people can often also very very nice people.

When I was writing my last book, I interviewed and lunched with a lot of New York Society Folks–you know, the Truman Capote “swans” of the 1950s? Adorable. I remember Suzzie Dillon calling and saying, “Darling, I’m so sorry I didn’t get back to you earlier, but we’ve just closed the Palm Beach house and opened the Fifth Avenue apartment and we’re breaking in a new cook, and well, you know what that’s like!”

17

:eek: So that’s not just a fictional stereotype?

[sub]Okay, I admit it. I’m clueless about the larger social world…[/sub]

18

Pondering some of the other remarks, such as *handy’s…

It seems to me that riches give one greater freedom to act, to crash and burn, to twist and distort, or to rise and inspire. Not that one needs great resources to twist and destroy on the personal level. But as Gassendi mentions, achieving riches requires a completely-different mindset and greater discipline than merely using riches. I’m glad that some people achieve riches while remaining good people and not wrecking themselves; that makes me feel a lot better about the world.

19

There are a few kinds of rich people, some are born rich, some achieve richess & some have it forced upon themselves.

20

And remember - there’s almost certainly people to whom you are rich and have in every corner something worth more than they earn in a year. [Insert point here]