The lesson of the inferior coat

In seventh grade, I was in need of a coat. I’d been in need of a coat for a while, but informed my parents of this fact at a rather ill planned time. We were in Sam’s, standing next to a table of coats. My mom asked me to describe the coat I wanted. It would be a bit wind and water proof. And a bit fuzzy on the inside. Lo-and-behold, the coats on the table were exactly that sort!

If your parents don’t mind buying you something nice, don’t feel bad about going for it.

That horrible, cheap, thin coat attempted to keep me warm for years. It kept me a bit warm. And it warded off a bit of the rain and fought off a bit of the drizzle. Why spend even more money on a new, better coat? Like most parents, mine made it clear that they were composed of flesh, blood, and other various gushy bits. Not money.

Eventually, in high school, I realized that I would need a new coat, if only to make the one mile to and from school bearable in winter. I procrastinated a couple of years and then finally got around to asking for a newer, nicer coat.

What is the moral of the story? First, if you need something that you are going to be using for years, don’t be afraid to cough up a bit of extra money for a bit of extra quality. But if it isn’t something you will need often, go with something more inferior. It seems obvious at first, but it’s easy to do the opposite. How many of us Rose girls have spent a rather silly amount of money on a pair of dress shoes we will wear once a year, while skimping out on the shoes that we must deal with every day?

The other moral is that you should gather some necessities on your parents buck while you can. This sounds slightly horrible, but it’s true. If your parents don’t mind buying you something nice, don’t feel bad about going for it. Once you enter the real world, you will have enough other financial burdens to deal with (housing, college debt, a car, possibly a wedding, and so on). If your parents can take care of some of your material necessities, let them.