“The best things in life are free
But you can keep ‘em for the birds and bees
Now give me money, that’s what I want
That’s what I want, yeah
That’s what I want”
–The Beatles

When I was a kid I wanted to be rich.  Not a football player, not an astronaut; rich is what I wanted.  I grew up in the era of Gordon Gecko, Alex P. Keaton, and that bad ass Scrooge McDuck with the swimming pool full of money.  Of course, there are people who tell you that money doesn’t buy happiness.  Ironically, only my broke buddies say that.  That’s like having a fat person tell you running is bad for your knees.

But, I have to admit that, to a certain extent, they’re right: money doesn’t buy happiness.  It buys all sorts of other crap that usually just ends up sitting around gathering dust.  I remember when I first had enough disposable income to buy something fancy.  One of my first extravagant purchases was on a high-end watch – pretty ironic since I’m never more than 5 feet away from four clocks at any given moment.  It looked good, but keeping time wasn’t really its forte.   A $20 Timex could’ve done the job, and adding a few zeros to that figure didn’t make it any more accurate.   Hell, for the price I paid for it, it better be able to turn back time.  But hey, it’s a status symbol.  People need to see how well I’m doing.  Or do they?  Who am I trying to impress?  My broke buddies don’t care.  My business associates have even nicer ones, crusted in enough jewels to make Liberace drool.  Maybe that gold digger at the club will give me some luvin’ if she sees me sporting a flashy time piece.  Great, that’s just what I need, some parasitic plastic playmate.  Now that we’ve checked off all the possible uses for the damn thing besides telling the time, what good is it?  It’s too nice to wear every day, so it now sits in a safety deposit box gathering dust.   I see it every six months when I put my renewed insurance papers in there.

All is not lost.   My childhood mentors were right about the importance of money; I just overestimated how much happiness would cost.  Take the purchase I made at the Maricopa Animal Care & Control department.  For $25 I bought a little black cat.   She’s an ordinary house cat that likes to play with string, stare out the window at birds, and shed on my nice clean folded clothes.  She was a hundredth of the cost of that fancy watch, but that little cat makes me happy every day.  No one’s ever going to be impressed with my mutt of a house cat. The only thing the gold diggers would get out of her is an allergy attack.  Yet I’d have to say she’s the best purchase I’ve made with my new found “wealth.”

Utility and cost are not always equal.  If you make your life about chasing after money, ask yourself: what exactly are you going to buy with it?  I’d advise against fancy baubles… unless of course you’re up for some gold digger luvin’.