Right after getting married, in accordance with the known rules of the universe, we were poor.
Each year got better, and now when the Wife stresses over bills, I can safely remind her to take a look around at the nice house, three cars, child in college and remember when she stressed over the same bills from the comfort of our folding futon in the living room of our 3-room roach nest with the front door that opened right onto the sidewalk.
Last night I reminded her of the soap scrap ball, the swanson’s pot pies and other things we did because we had to.
The soap scrap ball was just what it sounds like. When the shower soap became a useless scrap, it got added to the giant ball of useless soap scraps. The ball was kept in the soap dish, carefully so as not to get soaked and melt on it’s own. At SOME point, we would find ourselves out of money, low on soap, and have to resort to using the mishapen, many-colored ball of soap. By itself, it was usually good for about a week’s worth of showers.
After we moved into the second house we bought, I ceremoniously disposed of the soap acrap ball. And didn’t shed a tear.
What kind of seemingly silly things did you do when you were poor that remind you how far you’ve come?