What Really Matters

at least in my mind

A friend asked me the other day how many millions make up a billion. I had no idea but was informed by my trusty phone that it takes a thousand million to make a billion. As my other now-departed dear friend Betsy used to say, my mind doesn’t compute numbers that large. And at the time we were talking only about millions. Is it my jaded mind or has the world lost touch with reality? Personally, I find myself overwhelmed in the supermarket by the ridiculous variety of goods available. I suspect it has something to do with age but honestly don’t many of us long for a simpler time? No wonder many young people are having mental health issues when society seems to judge everyone by their stuff. And if there really are billionaires out there, why do many of them find it necessary to keep competing to prove that their’s is bigger? Absolutely no one needs all that crap.

So in case you think I woke up this morning in a foul mood, please let me correct the record. I am my usual happy self this morning having gone outside to pick up my Sunday paper from the driveway and still feeling some snow beneath my bare feet. I have taken to doing that every morning to prove that I’m still alive before I start my day. I love to go barefoot just about always, although I do remember once when I was a waitress in a downtown cafe being a bit aghast at an aging hippie who arrived to eat lunch barefoot. I don’t think the owner objected at the time, but I’m sure nowadays that would be grounds for dismissal. As a superannuated hippie myself nowadays I’m glad there’s no one to tell me how to behave. But having worn a school uniform and followed quite strict rules from my earliest education in Britain, I do recognize the benefits of conformity for group purposes. I am glad to now be able to choose whether I join any particular group and follow its norms, however. Freedom of choice is a very good mantra.

And back to the billions. I have way too much stuff as I originally shared as a hoarder. However, I hope I don’t have a billion of anything (pocketbooks and bags of all kinds may be getting close). But money is something I have always been quite clever at stretching to fill the need. I just don’t feel any need to amass a fortune when I have sufficient for the time. I’m extremely glad for the Medicare system and for the scientists who continue to learn how our bodies work. May they have all the billions they need to fund their research, but in many ways the old adages of early to bed and early to rise keeps a man healthy wealthy and wise and an apple a day keeps the doctor away seem to have held up over time. Add to that my lifelong habit of walking a lot and talking to strangers and I have a gazillionaire life.