Happy Spring!

Picture Courtesy of Martha Stewart Living

A few weeks ago as I was coming out of Starbucks with my tall Misto (in New Orleans they would call it a Cafe Au Lait, coffee & cream) in hand, I was stopped by a reporter from the Tennessean -she wanted to know if I was feeling the crunch and cutting back on luxury things. With the word luxury, several things began spinning around my head!


So the first thing I said to her was, -“Luxury means different things to different people”. I did not tell her this but for some - such as my friend Cruella—it means buying makeup from the drugstore and splurging on a $150 black Papier Mache crumber – she would not even know what a black Papier Mache crumber was so I did not go that route. However, I did tell her one thing that I could not cut out was my hair, I did not go into great detail because it would have taken more time then she would have cared to have heard; after all, it has taken me several years to explain it to my Hubby. I do know some women consider hair a luxury, especially every three weeks; even Cruella thinks that is luxury - but trust me, this is not because I must have Golden Chestnut Brown with red sparkling highlights - it’s because I refuse to look like Miss Daisy way before my time! Plus, deep down, I know if I attempt it myself, it will turn out bright orange and cost me more money in the long run. So yes! This actually saves me money! Also, as many of you know, a lot of women take their hair very seriously. While living in Charleston, I once bumped into women who traveled once a month from Atlanta to Charleston to have her hair done. After telling my hubby this, he then cooled it with the hair cost -after all, I could walk to my hair dresser.


Since I was holding my Starbucks, I thought I would should share with her my story from circa 2001 –I told her I felt the crunch back then, and cut out the pricy skinny lattes and the cappuccinos after my hubby had noticed that the month of January my Starbucks bill was close to 400.00.


After leaving her and talking about the luxury of coffee -I was able to ponder the question a little more – luxury and feeling the crunch! So here are my thoughts, which I could probably write a whole book on, but for the sake of this exercise I’ll keep it short and to the point.

Picuture courtesy of Martha Stewart Living

Flowers are probably considered luxury. I enjoy fresh flowers in the house - not expensive floral arrangement but very simple arrangements that take me five seconds to do. This is an argument my hubby gave up a long time ago, and now he comes to expect them by his bedside and in his bathroom. One flower I love that I won’t buy too much anymore are tulips. I bought them for a garden show in Savannah --huge, huge mistake -they don’t last very long (when I do buy them I want to last for a week or so). However, daffodils don’t last very long but I can cut them from my yard, and free is always good in this economy! Happy Spring!

Pictures Courtesy of Martha Stewart Living