It's All Relative

The worst thing about the New Year for me is having to have The Conversation. It happens every year.

Me: "We need to talk about money stuff."
Him: "I'm not making enough money and we're poor"
Me: "Well, first off, we're NOT poor"
Him: Stomps off to the other room.

A few hours later....

Me: "Do you want to talk about the money now?"
Him: "Just tell me how much more I have to make"
Me: "Well, there are other options than just trying to make more money"
Him: "We're poor; what does it matter?"

Sometimes I think I should tape-record this conversation because it seems to me that it happens the exact same way about this time every year.

From the very beginning of our marriage, I have always managed the finances. J just doesn't like to be bothered with trivial details like when the light bill is due. In the early years, he took more of an interest in looking at the big picture. But these days he just shows up on Sunday to collect his allowance and that's really all he wants to do with it. Somehow I'm supposed to make magic behind the scenes and do miracles with his paycheck.

Anyway, I gave him the bad news that we only have 3 more years before our savings runs out and we'll have to consider other options. He keeps insisting that we're "poor" which really, truly angers me. I mean, we have a nice house (with a mortgage, granted), nice cars (no payments on any of them), an airplane (again, no financing there, just outrageous insurance), and we even have a spot of land on a mountain in Montana (that we're currently trying to sell to finance the savings a bit longer). We have no credit card debt. No debt beyond the mortgage. I think it is an insult to the vast majority of the population of the earth to say that we're "poor".

Glad I got that off my chest. I'm sure tonight we'll both be dreaming numbers. I don't think I'll tell him that I should ovulate any day now and maybe we can add another mouth to feed to the poor-house.