His Dogness

“Praise God from Whom All Blessings Flow” by Garnet Goldman

This column first appeared in the April 2013 issue of Forsyth Family Magazine:

When I was a kid, I swore to myself that, when I grew up, I would never talk about how much things used to cost or get into arguments with other people about who did what when.

My grandmother would say something along the lines of, “Remember back in ’37 when Mildred got that new car…” and my grandfather would say, “That wasn’t in ’37. That had to be in the summer of ’38 because she got that Ford the same summer that Lorene got bursitis…” “That’s not right,” my grandmother would say, “because Lorene had bursitis the same time as…” and they would be off.

Although every now and then I can’t resist, I have mostly been pretty good about not getting into such disagreements. Having a spotty memory for what happened when helps immensely. As for the pledge not to talk about what things used to cost, I gave that up long ago. One of my favorites is how, when I was a kid, it cost a quarter to go to the movies and that the older sister of a friend of mine tried to organize a boycott when the price went up to 35 cents. And, whenever I bring up the fact that candy bars used to cost a nickel, I make sure to note that, in those days, candy bars were substantially bigger than the ones sold these days.

Although Sparkle Girl and Doobins find such facts of marginal interest, Sparkle Girl was attentive when I told her about how, when I was a kid, my dad had to get cash out of the bank before it closed on Friday or do without for the entire the weekend unless he found a store that would cash his check. Now you can get cash around the clock, and you need cash in fewer and fewer situations.

I was struck by how much has changed when a friend and I went down to City Hall. I was surprised to see that the block where we parked no longer has meters. In the middle of the block was a single electronic machine. You feed it and it dispenses a card that you put on the dash. Neither of us had a quarter, and, when we opened our wallets, a single $20 bill occupied each one. No problem. He inserted his credit card, punched in a request for the hour of credit that 25 cents would buy and out popped a card to put on the dash.

The way that money works has changed at lot not only out in the world but also inside my head over the years. I have felt rich twice in my life – both times in the days when my allowance was 25 cents a week and those substantial candy bars were a nickel. One time was when I was spending the afternoon with my father while he went about his business. We stopped at the hospital. He said he needed to go in by himself for a few minutes. He handed me a quarter and told me that I could spend it all at the little store next to the hospital. Wow! I could buy five candy bars if I wanted!

The other time was when I came across a dollar bill laying in a parking lot all by itself. Finding it like that was perfect. I didn’t have worry about turning it in for someone to claim as I would have if I had come upon it, say, in the hall at church. When that memory came to mind recently, I wondered how much it would take for me to ever feel that rich again. Now, even if we had enough money set aside for the kids’ education, a new furnace when the time comes and a comfortable retirement, I’m not sure I could ever recapture that feeling.