All The Things I Didn't Buy

confessions of a reforming spender

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Photo by Tīna Sāra on Unsplash

“I have the simplest tastes. I am always satisfied with the best.”

- Oscar Wilde: An Idler’s Impression by Edgar Saltus (1917)

It is the year of our Lord 2023, and Andrew and I aspire to be many things. One of the things we wish to become is a Less Spendy couple. The reasoning is thus: if I become a Less Spendy person, I am automatically a More Save-y person. And we all know that save-y people have a better time because there are accessible funds lying about for greater fun than the too-many-cups of coffee you’ll buy again this month. As a person cursed with good taste, expensive dreams, and a dislike of the word “no,” you’ll understand how hard it is to change my habits.

Hard, I say, but not impossible.

Budgets and I have never been simpatico. I am naturally allergic to anything that smacks of limitation and parsimoniousness. I’m not a spender-without-conscience, but I have never felt kinship with the people who like to bury their thousands under the corner of their mattress and live like paupers till they die rich. I’ve always thought that to live a modest but well-heeled life would be all I’d really want, financially.

But you know how it goes: keeping yourself well-heeled is all fine and dandy till prices inflate, your car needs repairs, or you simply get old enough to think, “My, we really ought to stockpile savings this year.”

We are all three in our current life: inflated, driving older vehicles, and wanting to save. So to help with this effort, we agreed that our spending beyond basics would need to be tightened up. For a while we just “didn’t spend” anything beyond basics which was helpful for a month or two but very unhinged when we got tired of it.

This year we agreed on a discretionary allowance that would permit us to each spend a modest, set amount on whatever we pleased each month. We can spend it all in one place or we can parse it out in a dozen tiny purchases. The money is intended to include things like non-essential clothing purchases, dinners or coffee with friends, a croissant at the bakery, a magazine subscription, a new book or game, etc. Whatever our choices, when the money is gone, it is gone.

We are a month and a half into this new year and the system is going well. For one thing, it’s taken away any sort of judgement we might hold for each other’s spending habits. It’s likewise taken away any kind of, “but your hobbies are more expensive than mine!” energy that leaves one or the other of us feeling inequitably frugal. It’s made me less trigger-happy about purchases. It’s made me realize how quick I am to forget I’ve spent money. And yes, it’s made me stop and consider what I truly want to buy, and why.

A funny thing about self awareness: it’s generally kind of embarrassing to own up to. When you choose to stand scrutiny though, you have the chance to learn how to hack your own brain and avoid the avoidable. Although we are only six weeks into the official system, this is something I’ve been studying and adjusting about myself for the better part of a year. And this is my year to employ all that intel. At this point I know I am prone to getting spendy IF….

• I am bored, because a fun purchase will liven things up, right?

• there is a cut-off (preorders, sales, etc.) that activates my motivated-by-deadlines personality and causes me to think I want something a lot more than I want it strictly because there is a limited time left to decide.

• I have been heavily marketed with said item (get off the socials, girl)

• my FOMO is activated by the idea that saying no to this thing will leave me less satisfied than having it would (ha ha)

• it’s pay-day and I feel like I deserve a splurge for having been so “good” the past two weeks

• I can rationalize the decision (I am great at rationalization)

• I am having a hard body image day (these are the days I tend to make spontaneous clothing purchases, as if a new outfit will help me feel better about something that is clearly rooted in my head and heart)

You mean I’ve been self-soothing with fun spending? You don’t say…

As someone who identifies as an Enneagram Seven, it comes as no surprise to me that overspending is something I can be prone to if I’m in a bit of a spiral, or trying to escape the mundane. The thing I love about this new, heightened awareness is that I can beat myself to the punch. If I’m tired and struggling mid-week to feel inspired by my work, I make a latte at home before my day begins. If I don’t bring my coffee, I know that I am going to really really want to stop for a latte to help me feel better. And do I actually want to guzzle a $6 latte, bleary-eyed, with my toddler in the car? Or would I rather save that money to spend when I can sit down and absorb the atmosphere of a coffee shop, get my cappuccino “for here,” and chat with a friend?

Because of this new way of reckoning with expenditures, it is now midway through February and the only thing I’ve bought so far has been some thank-you tulips for my sister. I’ve held up a lot of ideas to my mind’s eye and tried them on for size: should I buy this, or buy that? Should I save the money for next month? Should I spend it in one fell swoop? And because of all this back and forth, so far I’ve spent nothing. This is my FOMO working in reverse: if I spend now, what better thing might come along? I have to laugh at the long list of passed-over ideas; things which, prior to developing a better consciousness surrounding fun-money, I might’ve just sprung for because they are very good ideas.

Following is a list of all the arguably valid purchases I’ve considered making, but haven’t. They’re all really cool things, and this list would also work as inspiration for birthday or anniversary gifts - hi, Andrew - but I don’t need them right now, and I can’t have them all in the same month.

• a Phoebe Wahl woven blanket in “Sunshine” print

• seven pounds of fresh passionfruit

• two jars of Hana Farms lilikoi jam

• gardenia essence and mermaid mask from Leahlani skincare

• ten pounds of Meyer lemons to make into Claire Saffitz’s Meyer Lemon Bundt Cake (among other uses)

• the perfect pair of green overalls

• By Bread Alone by Kendall Vanderslice

• The Lives We Actually Have by Kate Bowler

• Very fancy chocolate for eating during the final chapter of a book (eyeing Raaka choc as well as Bliss Chocolatier)

• multiple things I don’t need from Anthropologie’s 40% off sale of their clearance section

• The Women Before Me tee from Go + Tell Gals

• a pedicure

• a fancy brunch out at a favorite restaurant (Codex) when they paired up with my favorite coffee shop (Kobros)

• a bouquet of ranuculus

• Henry Rose clean fragrance in “Char”

• a piece from artist Katie Rodgers - particularly one of her newly listed pastel studies, or a print of “Garden Rabbit”

• Graza olive oil

• flowers for my front pots, even though I know they will die in the frost that will definitely come back

• a swimsuit that is chic, but asking for weird tan lines

As an adult, I have learned that (for my personality) the anticipation of an experience is nearly the height of pleasure in the entire experience. This insight has helped me so much in all aspects of life. I love to dream about how something will be. I love the dizzying height of waiting for something that is definitely happening, and while I do enjoy having the actual experience…I have found that the very best, most fulfilling moment of delight is the second before that experience actually begins. I thrill to it. Anticipation of future enjoyment is the shiniest of ephemeral pleasures to me.

So what does this have to do with spending and budgets?

Only this: I think that my favorite part is the permission to go absolutely bananas with my fun money and spend it however I wish. I can waste it, gift it, invest it, spend it, donate it, bop it, twist it, flick it. Knowing that I have the permission and the power to dispense it as I see fit has actually made me far more scrutinizing when the moment comes. I can do anything with it, so I savor all of that potential. Sometimes I scratch the itch of buying something I want by loading it into my online shopping cart and then never buying it. Just knowing I could seems to be all the satisfaction I need. A couple of days later I’ll revisit the cart and delete everything, content with having hypothetically made these purchases and having mental ownership for a little while.

As a rule, this tactic of pretending to make purchases does not delight Andrew - he is a man who lives solidly in the moment or in past moments, not the flashing future - but our fresh system of spending benefits him in his own way. He knows exactly what he wants to spend it on, often before the month begins, and he spends it there and it’s all he’s ever wanted and he’s thrilled by that one purchase.

For the both of us, this is a good practice. I’ve been reflecting lately on needs vs. wants and on cultivating a less-materialistic life. I am not a materialistic person by nature - it isn’t things I want so much as enjoyment - but I do tend to get materialistic when I am in a period of stress or exhaustion and fun seems hard to find. That’s when I’ll throw some coins to the wind in a bid for entertainment. The thing is, though, buying more, making more, having more in general is not what satisfies. The entertainment it brings (usually) is limited. The home we live in is small and there isn’t anything I really need. I don’t buy as many books now that I live up to road from an excellent library. My body is shapeshifting all the time and I don’t currently want to buy new clothes as it settles into whatever it is doing. It will be months and months before the water here is warm enough to need a swimsuit. As much as I’d love seven pounds of passionfruit, I don’t know what I’d do with it all. And anyway, it seems silly to buy Meyer lemons and a new sweater when there are thousands and thousands of people yet trapped under earthquake rubble in Turkey and Syria. Maybe I should donate my spending money this month.

This isn’t a full-on news bulletin: RACHEL CRACKS CODE FOR SPENDING LESS as much as it is an admission of my own frailty and how I’m trying to overcome it, typed while eating a packet of protein oatmeal and two raspberry linzer cookies with my cup of tea. There is powdered sugar on my laptop. The house is quiet because Andrew left early. I kept the lights off and lit my best candle instead, and played Laufey from my phone while I warmed the tea kettle; outside it is raining and the only sound (besides my keyboard) is the whiiiiiiiissshhhhhtttt of an occasional car passing through puddles on the street at 45 mph. Mozzie, our ginger tabby, just put himself to sleep in the marigold colored cushion-bed that is his. In a little while I will pick up Bono’s memoir and read another couple chapters, take my vitamins (because I am thirty now and we take vitamins in this decade), and then get ready upstairs. I might even curl my hair. All is soft and early and enjoyable to the max. And none of it cost me a red cent.

See? I am reforming. I can enjoy things that are free and already mine. It only took limiting myself to free me. Tricky thing, paradoxes. They always take me by surprise.

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