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“I’m giving this,” my eldest proclaimed, waving a twenty under my nose.
My eyebrows went up. “You sure about that? Twenty dollars is a lot of money, baby. The note said they wanted your class to donate change–coins, not paper money.”
“It’s fine! I’ve got plenty of money!” she said airily, and in a flash I saw her whole life played out with remarkable similarity to her father’s.
Fear inspired me to direct the child to bring forth all her cash. I fetched a pen and a couple envelopes. “Count it all,” I told her. “Let’s see how much you’ve earned in allowances these past few months.”
In two minutes she’d produced neatly divided piles of cash and coins. She named a sum that seemed excessive for a child of her age, and once again I rued the unwisely-generous nature of her father, who tosses her fives, tens and the occasional twenty without backing up the gifts with proper education and instruction.
“Ok baby, let’s make a budget for your money,” I said. “Christmas is coming up soon. Let’s make a list of who you are going to want to buy presents for.” On one envelope she wrote their names and the amounts she intended to spend on each person, then she carefully placed the total into the envelope.
“I’ll be your bank,” I told her. “I’ll keep your money for the few weeks, and I’ll even give you interest for it.” She worried that I’d “use” her money, so we had a short discussion of how banks guarantee that their customers will get their money back, with a fee for having “used” it.
Next we prepared an envelope for deposit in her actual bank account, an account which I set up for her years ago and into which she’s made semi-regular contributions. Then she counted up what was left. “I want to keep some money too,” she fretted, “in case I find a Polly I want.”
“Sure, honey. You need to keep some money just to spend.”
After some not inconsiderable angst, she divided up her remaining money between a envelope marked “Donation” and her own purse. “Good job baby. You just made a budget.” She beamed, in her own characteristically low-key fashion. And then I offered to show her how I keep track of my money.
I pulled up a couple of spreadsheets and my online banking screen. “Is that ‘x’ dollars?” she asked, pointing to one particularly large payment.
I peered at the screen. “No honey, it’s ‘x’ hundred dollars. See, these are the things I need to pay every month. Here’s the money I make every month. And here,” I pointed to the online banking screen, “are the bank accounts we use to pay our bills. See how I have several accounts?”
She nodded, still aghast that the cost of our house was one hundred times what she expected. “This account is for our day-to-day stuff, like groceries. This is for some big bills I know we’ll have in the next several months. And this is for emergencies.”
“What kind of emergencies?” she wondered.
“Like if our roof had to be fixed,” I said, making a note to call the roofer before the leak in my bedroom grew worse. “Or if we needed a new furnace. Or if one of us got very sick.”
She nodded, and I continued. “It’s just like your accounts. You have some money to use now,” I pointed to her purse, “and some to use later,” I said, nodding toward her Christmas envelope. “And in the bank you have some to use much later, or for emergencies. And you have some to donate.” She nodded. “Doesn’t it feel good to have your money organized?”
“Yeah,” she said. “I was going to give away too much.”
“More than you could afford to give away, yes,” I corrected gently, as she grabbed her purse and zipped off to play with her siblings.
And as has happened so many times when I’ve attempted to pass on some hard-earned wisdom to my child, I’m left feeling as though I’ve said way too much and not nearly enough all at once.
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