Frugality

I am as frugal as it is possible for me to be.  That does not mean that everything that I do in my life is frugal, only that I do the best that I can in whatever circumstance the moment finds me.

But, I really try to never waste a thing.  Not a dollar, not food, not anything.  I am not always as successful as I would like, but, hey, I am giving it my best, at least most of the time.  Really.

I can toss off bits of my heart from time to time, but if you are going to live in the world as fully as possible, then that is the cost of doing business.  Now that I am thinking about it, being generous is an essential part of being a truly frugal person.  I am experiencing a rough time and it seems that my ability to be the person that I believe myself to be is one is one struggle, one difficult situation, one choice after another.  I am that.  I am generous.  Really.

The thing is that I know how privileged I am and that my problems are disgustingly minor.  The other thing is that I see, at least on the days when I am in town, that the world is full of wonderful people with terrible worries.  The next thing is that I get that.  The other, other thing is that even privileged slackers like me should not be denied a little happiness once in a while.  Yeah.  Me.  Selfish.  Bitch.  At least that is what if feel like today.  Why am I making the wrong choices all the damn time? 

This is not being helped, all this angst, by recovering from another of my frugal ways, which is not wasting food.  Not too long ago I was chastised, and not in a good way, about tossing out food that might be questionable in the whole safe to eat realm.  I stand by my belief that if you have any doubt about food being safe to eat that you just toss it.  No second thoughts, no hesitation, no regrets.

For some reason, probably stupid finances again, but last week I ate the last of some soup that I had made five days prior.  Just two days longer than I would have normally tossed the remains into the garbage.  In my defense, I was being frugal and it was good soup.  It is now ten days later and I am still recovering from that food poisoning.

Two housewifely accidents.  First the foot ( healing nicely, by the way), then the soup.  This keeping house stuff is too dangerous.

Clearly, this whole frugality thing is becoming an obsession and like all obsessions is taking over.  So not a good thing.  It makes me think of the Frugal Gourmet guy, I think that Graham Kerr was his name, although I am not certain about the spelling.  I remember hearing him on his television program talk about the/his true meaning of frugality that is was not about being cheap, or maybe even thrifty, but about using what you have to it's best advantage.

I try to do that.  Really.