At the Money Zoo

We tag team parent, so together time can be as little as 5 or 6 hours a week. DH works 6am-2pm on days I work 3pm-midnight. On my days off, DH works 6am-6pm. Usually, once or twice a week, I work 7am-4pm. Dinner is at 5:30 or 6 each evening, and DS's bedtime routine starts at 8pm. This leaves very little together time for the family unit. Throw chores in there, and you can see the reason I blog mostly after midnight. Family outings are the very important to the glue that holds us together.

We routinely have small family outings. The park is a great outlet and in the summer, we buy a pool pass. Heck, DH & DS just got in trouble at the local library on Monday night. It seems that DS doesn't understand why there are books everywhere, but he can't yell, run amok, play with a train set, or wrap the employees around his finger. He is totally convinced that the library is just another location of mommy's store.

About once a month, we try to plan something to shake up the routine. This can mean a trip to see my parents, a big vacation to Disneyworld, a trip to the circus or in the case of this month: a trip to the zoo. Jiving all of these things with our No Buy goals is always a little tricky. The don't truly fall in to the "need" category or do they? This time is so valuable to us, and it is so important to get away from the everyday routine to focus on togetherness, that it seems to devalue it to classify it as a want. Of course, if things got too tough, the family outings would change in nature.

Our trip to the zoo last week was a blast. However, as the focus of my daily life has become more money focused, I find myself evaluating every penny spent on these mini-vacations. I also am beginning to see money for what it truly is and how others spend it or throw it away.

Let's take a look at this guy:

At first, we were all excited by Mr. (or Ms.-sorry, wasn't going over the fence and getting close enough to find out) American Alligator. Both boys love, love, love gators and crocs. They get over the top excited; arms waving, fingers pointing and raised voices. I was admiring the smile of ol' toothy here and reveling in the bit of sunshine. I was thinking how much that gator was enjoying the first nice and warm day we'd had in weeks. We were laughing at how still he was and then I noticed it. (Sorry I couldn't get a better close up to demonstrate my point.) That gator had money! The spots around his back feet and along his tail are coins. He even had two shiny pennies on his lower back. Under his front claws was a quarter! I counted almost $2 from what I could see. (Again, not getting close enough to get all the facts.)

Now, I may have admired this gator's smile, and I may have been spending money on our zoo trip, but I dang sure don't have money to just "throw to the gators!" Who does this? Not only is it a bit cruel, well, maybe, he didn't seem to be bothered by it at all, it's just plain stupid. This is not some fountain that will be cleaned out and the money donated to the zoo. If people wanted to do that, there are giant coin banks in the shapes of animals all over the place. It's just people throwing things at an animal to see if it would move! Maybe they just had money to burn. I don't really know. But I do wonder if they truly know the value of a dollar.

Flash forward about 45 minutes. We are standing in front of the carousel and the ticket machine is broken. There is a sign pointing me to a snack wagon about 30 yards away to get the admission. I leave the boys watching the carousel, and DS's excitement is growing. It's $2 a ride for non-members, so it will be $6 total. As I'm waiting for the girl to get our tickets, I notice in the crack between the stainless steel outer counter and the window, there is a dime. I immediately think, "if I can get that dime, the ride will only cost us $5.90!" So, the entire time she's getting us our tickets, I am doing my best to retrieve a dime.

Now, before you're like, "wow, she's crazy, it's just a dime!" let me give the short explaination: I believe that money comes to us. I believe that when it comes to us, and we ignore it, it is our own fault that it stops coming to us. I could write a ton on this, and at some point, I probably will, but I'll leave it at that for now.

Eventually, I become aware of the girl staring at me and the boys glaring at me across the way and give up. I have driven myself nuts ever since, because I am sure that if I had just dug out my keys instead of using my fingernails, I could've gotten that dime! But, give up, I did. Now, if you're thinking how can she spend $6 on a 2 minute ride when she obsessed on a dime? Well, here you go:

Now, that may have been a pure "want" on DS's behalf. But, I've got to tell you: It's like a balm on my heart when we have moments like this. That's definitely a need.