Synchronicity strikes again!
My grand niece has been working part time with a Charity and has just got her first pay cheque. She sent me a photograph of the cheque and I congratulated her and told her that my first pay cheque way back in 1961 was for an amount less than five percent of what she has now got. The smart girl that she is she promptly commented that it must have been worth much more to which I had to agree. I could pay rent, buy prepaid coupons for sixty four meals and still be left with left over cash for petrol for my two wheelers and entertainment. With what My GN has now got she would perhaps be just about able to afford a paying guest accommodation on a room sharing basis somewhere in Pune.
I wanted to send her a photograph of my appointment letter but instead sent her the photograph of my my second appointment letter where I had actually taken a cut in pay as I wanted to move to another city to be with my then flame and had to accept what came my way. I was reminded of my mentioning to my then flame that the grass was not greener for me in that particular instance.
I had hardly recovered from that memory when I read Ekoshapu’s blog post Task List For 2019 and I learnt something new!
I had to admit that despite my being such a voracious reader, I had never before come across this particular saw which makes more sense than the conventional “The grass is greener on the other side of the fence”. In my case, my accepting a lower pay to suit my convenience was indeed finding the grass greener where I was watering it!
Thank you Ekoshapu for giving me a new saw which is priceless.
The change in prices is indeed something to marvel about. Our house cost $30,000 in 1965. We lay awake back then, thinking we had made an awful mistake. It’s “worth” almost 10 times that amount today, and yet it really isn’t. It’s not one of these new McMansions, that’s for sure. A small house by today’s standards, with a dinky kitchen. But it’s home.
People often think the grass is greener on the other side, but they’re equally likely to think the grass is greener on THIS side. For example, all the people who say Britain is the best country in the world or the NHS is the best health service in the world. I guess it’s the difference between the perennial miseries who think everything’s better than what they actually have, and those happy souls who make the most of what they have and believe grass is much the same everywhere.
It sometime good to jump the fence and take look at your side of the fence. It could be pretty good also.
I can understand why this younger generation lives at home or have room mates.
Coffee is on
Very often, going across the fence may be thrust up on us. I still like the idea of watering the grass where one is rather than going deliberately to find greener grass.
Another one is “Bloom where you are planted.” That works too!
That reminds me of Voltaire’s famous “Neither need you tell me,” said Candide, “that we must take care of our garden.”
regarding the resolutions, last year I chose 3 words: adventurous, quirky and magical. I believe I used them to the best of my abilities. This coming year, I have goal like your linked-post…which says to me, stabilise what I started last year 🙂 or if something fabulous just arrives, it was meant to be…
As for even thinking of anything right now, I hadn’t even organised anything for Christmas other than the late, late booking for a fabulous trip away. At one point some of us on the trip were talking about 2019 but in the main, none of had even thought about it as such…
Catherine de Seton recently posted..Back home…will update soon!
As you probably already know, I live by the Zen observation – Sitting quietly, doing nothing, spring comes and the grass grows by itself. It works for me.
my word for this year, suddenly appeared…and instead of a string of words from last year, it’s just EXPLORE both inner and outer self…I think it fits in well, as I intend to do that, not all in one day but just as it comes…
Great idea. All the best.