***Taken from Kris “PlumbingGirl” Jordan’s personal blog***
My boyfriend and I got to spend the weekend in Estes Park- a beautiful quiet retreat in the mountains of Colorado. We had never been to this specific Lodge before, and just like the first time you go anywhere new, you explore a little- decide what you can skip and what you don’t want to miss.
I didn’t mind missing the snow shoeing- I’m just not that ambitious when it comes to winter activities beyond sitting by a fire with a blanket, cup of hot green tea and an intriguing book. We were about 15minutes from the town and the Lodge offered a quaint restaurant on premises. My boyfriend looked over the menu while I unpacked a bag.
“Well, do you want to stay here for dinner, or head to the pub in town?” I ask.
“Um, town,” he says.
I look at him quizzically, “Is it hippie food?”
Anything with vegetables or cheese other than American is coined ‘hippie’ food by my sexy meat and potatoes eating man.
“I wasn’t thinking hippie, I’m thinking something else. It starts with an ‘E’.”
An ‘E’? I have no idea what he means, so I pick up the menu and look at it. OHHH! He means “expensive“. I laugh.
I love my honey, I really do, and yet he still hasn’t learned to stop using the “E” word. I’m not bragging that I’m more enlightened or anything, well, maybe I am, but I stopped using the ‘E’ word several years ago.
Expensive is relative and therefore pointless. It only means what it means to the person who uses it.
Here’s an example:
When in Estes Park, we walked the shops. One was a thrift store. I picked up a package of Jordach Lipstick. I Googled this product online to see when it was last made (my guess was 1989, but there was no date on the package itself) The best article I found on the topic, dates them to the mid 1990′s. So, potentially, at best, this product has been sitting on that thrift store shelf for 8 years. The dollar amount charged for this product is EXPENSIVE. You know why? Because the value is $0.00. So any amount the shop keep would like for it, is over value. Unless, of course, you would like the sickly look of copper, silver or gold lips and the toxic poisoning of such.
So, truly, expensive is simply a matter of value.
I took a $3000 trip to Disney World Resort this year. It was NOT expensive, because I got tremendous value in spending time with my teen daughters, in Florida, for several days, away from work. Fabulous!
I also spent $3.55 on truffle fries from Lark Burger. They were NOT expensive, they were DELISIOUSLY valuable.
Here’s what IS expensive:
a 19.99/mo gym membership that is NEVER used.
a $5 gallon of milk bought at a convenience store because I was too lazy to drive ONE MORE block to the grocery who sells it for $3.5o.
The $10 sneakers I bought at the thrift store when I wanted to start running. My knees and back hurt and after 4 trips to the Chiropractor (at $55 a pop), she asked to see my running shoes and threw them in the trash. THAT was expensive.
Do you agree/ disagree? Where in your life did something with a high price tag hold so much value, that “expensive” never crossed your mind?
On the other hand, when was something with a LOW dollar amount, actually very expensive?
