A thrifty midwestern person in Phoenix, Arizona


Since I've lived in Phoenix, and Southern California, for all of my adult life, which is, ahem, longer than I care to admit, I often look back on my midwestern upbringing in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and scoff.

I've never made it a secret why I left - I hate being cold, and Minneapolis is cold most of the time. Very cold. Very, very, cold. But the city is a beautiful one, and I was raised with good, old-fashioned midwestern morals and ethics, including being very thrifty. And as goofy as that sounds, it's served me well out west.

I have to admit to being fascinated by the "laid back" attitude of Phoenix, and California. It seemed as if everyone back in the midwest was so uptight about everything, especially money. Midwestern people, especially my family, are pretty tight with a buck. I remember at the zoo that we kids weren't allowed to get soda, because, as I can still hear my mom saying, "We could buy twelve cans for that price, at the grocery store!" And so the first time I got a Coke at the zoo in Phoenix it felt ridiculous. I really don't go to places like that much, but when I do I often look at the price of things, and think, "Ridiculous! I could buy a whole six-pack for that price!"

I applied this type of economy when I was a "starving student" at ASU, and I really didn't starve. I could take a penny and stretch it until it screamed. I knew a lot of people who seemed to burn through all of their money no matter how much they had, and I just tried not to think about it. Most of these people would go back to their parents when they ran out of money, but it wasn't something I wanted to do, I wanted to earn my way through college, and then for the rest of my life. I wouldn't buy a hamburger at McDonalds, I would buy a pound of hamburger, and have several hamburgers. I could invite friends over, and if you've ever had one of my "Brad Burgers", you know!

This was wonderful, but this way of thinking started to backfire on me as I got older, and was able to spend more money. There were times when I went over to California, and instead of having fun, I came back with just about as much money as I started with. So I taught myself the concept of "California coupons", which meant that I had to force myself to spend them. And it opened up a wonderful world for me. I still use this concept when someone gives me some money as a gift, I spend it, all of it, I don't put it in the bank. Don't worry about me going overboard with this, I'll be just fine.

Yes, I know the joke about the guy who was too cheap to read the newspaper, for fear it would wear out his reading glasses! And I really don't want to be that guy. But I know the value of a dollar, and being wasteful actually pains me, so I'll continue to be a thrifty midwestern person in Phoenix.
History Adventuring on Patreon

 Click here to become a Patron!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Why cars in the future won't need stop signs, red lights, or stripes on the road

Image
Time-travel with me into the future. Where we're going, we'll still need roads, but our cars won't need the kind of stuff that human drivers need, like stop signs, or stuff painted on the road. And if you're already panicking that computers will take over, don't worry, they already have. The fact that you're reading this right now combines so much amazing computing power that it would have been unthinkable to anyone in the 1960s, or '70s, when I was a kid. Speaking of being in the geriatric age group, if you're like me or older, you took a lot of pride in knowing the rules of the road, such as what to do at a stop sign if four cars approach at the same time, the difference between a "yield" sign and a "merge" sign, or maybe how to parallel park. But calm down there old-timer, that type of knowledge will just be as quaint as how to use a horse and buggy is nowadays. Sorry! The best way to picture how traffic will flow in the future is
Read more

Why did Adolf Hitler always have such a bad haircut?

Image
As someone who has been interested in history since I was a little kid, I've always asked the most childish questions, and quite often never got an answer. As a kid, I was told to run along and play, and don't bother the grownups, so I set my questions aside to work on when I myself became a grownup. But some questions I really haven't found a satisfactory answer for, and get thrown away as I find myself learning the more important stuff. I now understand the grownups, but the kid in me still has childish questions like "Why did Adolf Hitler always have such a bad haircut?" The first question to ask is whether a particular style (whether hair, clothing, etc.) was in style at the time. The moustache was, and you can Google a photo of Charlie Chaplin, who wore the same style of moustache at the time, and quite stylishly. The wide lapels were in style in the 1930s, as was were the tall shirt collars and small ties. But the haircut wasn't - it's just awful. Me
Read more

Watching a neighborhood grow and change in Phoenix, Arizona

Image
I stopped to take a closer look yesterday at where the old Circle K had been in my neighborhood, which is a suburb of Phoenix. And it's got me to thinking about how much Phoenix grows and changes over the years, and how people feel about it. This particular neighborhood was built in the mid 1980s, when there had been only a smattering of houses and a community college (Glendale Community College, built in 1965). There are some houses that I can tell are from the 1970s, and a few even older, but what happened here is that the neighborhood suddenly appeared in 1985 or thereabouts. There are three shopping centers on the corner of 67th Avenue and Peoria - the one in the photo is called "Peoria Station", and it was designed to kinda look like a train station. The other three are called Westporte Village, Brittany Square, and Crossroads Plaza. I've lived in this neighborhood for a very long time, and no one ever uses those names, even though the signs are still up. But the
Read more