A few years back, pre-kids, my husband and I wandered into an antique store looking for nothing in particular. Spotting a china set laid out on a table near the door, we eyed it discreetly.

What happened next reminds me of the carpenter ant that, just the other day, tripped into a spider’s thread underneath the radiator in our kitchen. The spider materialized from this thread and nabbed the ant — kneading it deftly — its long legs like like two arms, elbows raised, over a washtub. Patiently, the spider wrapped the thrashing ant until it was still.

Of course, buying the china set wasn’t fatal. In fact the shop’s proprietor fairly snuggled my husband and me in warm feelings about all the future happiness our *$150 purchase would bring. And it may, if it ever makes it out of our basement, where it still sits, since we don’t have room to store it anywhere else.

Even though we can’t afford this kind of impulse buying anymore, it’s still our pattern, particularly mine. When we have money, we spend it, and when we don’t, all of the stuff we want to do but can’t is like a cold that zaps my energy and sends me to bed. So even though it’s hard for me to believe that we can create a plan that will work for us (we tried using the envelope system, but I just stole cash from one to cover another) … well, you know. We can’t go on like this, anyway.

*A guess, since that receipt is long gone.

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Tags:   ant · browsing · china · first post · impulse buying · impulse purchase · impulse spending · spider · suckerNo Comments