I’m a cheapskate. We probably all have that somewhere in our personal gene pools – a little thing where we’re unwilling to spend money.
It might be something stupid like driving across town to save three cents a gallon on gasoline, while you’re wasting all that gas by driving there. Or something stupid like joining a buying club for $177 annually where you only use about $81 of their services each year. Those are the types of blind spots many of us live with. We turn off our logical and practical side to go with emotion or stubbornness instead: “I’m not spending three bucks on THAT!”
I broke my reading glasses over a month ago. Did I replace them? Of course not. They still worked despite the fact that the left stem snapped off and couldn’t be taped back.
So, I read with the left stem missing. This means bending the glasses as I put them on so they don’t stay cockeyed on my nose, making me read the newspaper, my phone or anything else at our kitchen table by tilting my head the opposite way.
There’s nothing wrong with this. I don’t care if I look weird or cheap. Who’s going to see me? If my wife or kids mock me, I can live with that. They’ve mocked me before and will mock me again, I’m quite confident of that.
It’s a slight inconvenience, sure. But I can easily afford a new pair of reading glasses at Walmart or any one of twenty other stores that sell them at retail for a throwaway price. I don’t care about style (obviously, since I already look dorky with the stem missing).
Which makes it slightly ironic and strange that I don’t go out and buy a new pair. Itseems like a waste of time and money because the current pair still functions.
Until recently, that is. This past week, bending them to fit on my nose hasn’t quite let them settle comfortably they way they had been. Instead, even after giving them a good twist, they stay slightly askew and make reading more of a task.
This led to one of those short conversations with my wife, which seem to happen with more regularity during the progression of marriage, describing the rationale on giving up some small behavior. I typically couch it like this:
“You won’t believe this.” (Attempting to get her full attention.) “After using those broken reading glasses for the past six weeks, I’m giving in.” (She smiles amusingly, knowing what’s coming next.)
“I’m going to buy a new pair. These broken ones have gotten inconvenient and useless.”
She doesn’t laugh or hound me, knowing it takes me time to admit my mule-headedness about something that makes absolutely no sense to begin with. But, I reckon we all go there sometimes.
It’s on my list to head off a “reading glasses purchase” journey. It won’t cost much and it won’t take long, so who knows why I avoided it. Yet I did for almost two months. Some things in life remain a mystery.
It might be something stupid like driving across town to save three cents a gallon on gasoline, while you’re wasting all that gas by driving there. Or something stupid like joining a buying club for $177 annually where you only use about $81 of their services each year. Those are the types of blind spots many of us live with. We turn off our logical and practical side to go with emotion or stubbornness instead: “I’m not spending three bucks on THAT!”
I broke my reading glasses over a month ago. Did I replace them? Of course not. They still worked despite the fact that the left stem snapped off and couldn’t be taped back.
So, I read with the left stem missing. This means bending the glasses as I put them on so they don’t stay cockeyed on my nose, making me read the newspaper, my phone or anything else at our kitchen table by tilting my head the opposite way.
There’s nothing wrong with this. I don’t care if I look weird or cheap. Who’s going to see me? If my wife or kids mock me, I can live with that. They’ve mocked me before and will mock me again, I’m quite confident of that.
It’s a slight inconvenience, sure. But I can easily afford a new pair of reading glasses at Walmart or any one of twenty other stores that sell them at retail for a throwaway price. I don’t care about style (obviously, since I already look dorky with the stem missing).
Which makes it slightly ironic and strange that I don’t go out and buy a new pair. Itseems like a waste of time and money because the current pair still functions.
Until recently, that is. This past week, bending them to fit on my nose hasn’t quite let them settle comfortably they way they had been. Instead, even after giving them a good twist, they stay slightly askew and make reading more of a task.
This led to one of those short conversations with my wife, which seem to happen with more regularity during the progression of marriage, describing the rationale on giving up some small behavior. I typically couch it like this:
“You won’t believe this.” (Attempting to get her full attention.) “After using those broken reading glasses for the past six weeks, I’m giving in.” (She smiles amusingly, knowing what’s coming next.)
“I’m going to buy a new pair. These broken ones have gotten inconvenient and useless.”
She doesn’t laugh or hound me, knowing it takes me time to admit my mule-headedness about something that makes absolutely no sense to begin with. But, I reckon we all go there sometimes.
It’s on my list to head off a “reading glasses purchase” journey. It won’t cost much and it won’t take long, so who knows why I avoided it. Yet I did for almost two months. Some things in life remain a mystery.
