Greed

Today's story is Greedy Mariani, another from Haiti. Unfortunately, I can't find an online version of it, so I will have to provide a synopsis for the purposes of my discussion: Mariani is a woman, and she is very rude to her houseguests. She lets people in, treats them very poorly, and then takes their money before kicking them out. One day she lets in a traveler who carries with him four bags of silver. Upon his leaving the next morning, he says he will leave her with one bag, but of course she wants all four, so she follows him down the road as he leads his mules away. She follows him for a while, shouting for him to give her her due, and he leads her right to the edge of a graveyard, where he turns around, revealing his true nature. He is a zombi! Mariani falls down dead of shock.

Now, as a contrast to Mariani, I will tell you a story about my mother. My mother is very good with money. It is thanks to her frugality and wise saving that our family has much of the money it has, not to mention her tireless work for as a nurse in the same hospital for the past... 30 years? Something like that. If anyone in my family is reading, feel free to correct any factual errors. In any case, I used to be not so fond of her practice of frugality, thinking it cheap or stingy. I am not very good with money. I give it away rather freely and have at times spent it on rather useless things. In any case, my opinion about my mother's spending habits changed a few years ago when she pointed something out to me. For all her scrimping and saving, she spends money quite freely when she finds something worth spending it on. For her, that's things for her family. Whenever an unexpected bonus or tax rebate comes her way, she thinks of us first and is happy and even excited to buy something new.

I have come to see saving money as a sort of moral or ethical issue lately. It has always been a bit difficult for me to find the discipline required to save money on a daily basis. I can usually go without buying myself unnecessary items, but I eat out more than I need to, have been pursuing ridiculously expensive art practices, and spend a lot on things like movies and other entertainments. I don't really think of myself as greedy, although prodigal probably wouldn't be too far off. Lately, though, I've been forced to pretty bluntly face a certain reality of money: there are a lot of people out there who simply don't have any. I try to be charitable, and I make a point never to let my (skewed) perceptions of my own lack of funds prevent me from giving to people who clearly need it more, but lately I've realized that I can do more than that. Can't I be more careful about what I spend, the luxuries I allow myself, so that more of the money I make can go elsewhere? For the time being, of course, I'm speaking about Haiti. Sometimes I think of how much money America spends on war. I try not to, because it's massively depressing, but I wonder how much nicer the world would be if that money went towards feeding people and keeping them healthy. With that in mind, I've been trying my best to save money lately, so that, like my mother, I can spend it on what is truly important to me.

I don't want to use this blog as an opportunity to preach, but I really do hope you'll consider using the link at the top of my page to donate to Partners in Health. You don't have to give much, anything you think you can spare will help, but really think hard about where that money would be going if you didn't donate it. As I imagine (and hope) that this will be a thought-provoking topic, I encourage your feedback.