Have you seen The Simpsons Movie? Well, I just had an epiphany, and there wasn't an Inuit woman in sight. Ready for this? I have decided that it's okay if my income never increases beyond normal cost of living raises. Seriously! I don't make a lot of money BY ANY MEANS, but I am able to afford an apartment I like a lot in a neighborhood I love. I keep food on the table and my modest car well serviced. I have a retirement fund and small savings account. I'm able to make it through Christmases and birthdays without selling my soul, and I can manage a decent vacation every other year or so. I pay my share of my son's tuition at the greatest school in the world. I can afford books (and bookshelves) as long as I keep my eye on things, and I replace clothes or shoes as needed and as things I love go on sale. I even budget out money for various charities that are important to me.
What else do I need? Nothing.
So there. Maybe it means little to you, but ever since I was in college I had this, "Someday when I have money . . . " mindset. I envied my doctor/lawyer/pharmacist/engineer friends for their incomes, and often wanted to kick myself right in the useless English Writing degree.
And now guess what? I just realized that it's okay if I never have any more money than I do right now.
Despite my good girl, please the adults facade, I am coming to terms that there's something I share with Bart, rather than with Lisa Simpson: I'm an underachiever and proud of it.
5 comments:
What a great epiphany! I wish I could get to that point. After I saw that movie I had the song "Spider Pig" stuck in my head for a week.
Oh, but underachiever you're not! Finder of life's happiness, that ever elusive thing called satisfaction, you are. That is a treasure indeed.
That's not underachievement. That's merely achievement. So, right off, it's even better than you thought.
Me, I'm more like Sideshow Bob.
-J.
Yes, yes, yes! (Says the librarian with a 12 year old car who lives in a 3rd floor walk-up.)
You're self-supporting. You have a place to live and enough to eat. You save money. That is NOT an underachiever.
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