Funding Fun

Maintenance, it's all about maintenance now.  Maintain the boobs with the yearly mammogram, the teeth with the six month cleaning, the brain with the bi-annual visit to the neuro, hair; every four weeks, nails; every two weeks,  skin routine; 30 minutes nightly to slather all my creams on. And this week the annual Finance Review.  

When Money Man shows us the graph of how the market has performed over the past 15 years, I see the Rocky Mountains.   When he points to a certain year to talk about the bull market of the 90's, I'm trying to remember to whom I was married at the time.  When he shows us the huge dip in the market in the early part of the century, I'm wondering who was president and if I can use this information to my advantage when encountering a political adversary.  In other words...*yawn*.....

I really don't worry about my investments.  I mean, what can I do about them?  They are in the hands of some mysterious Fund Manager--whom I imagine to be somewhat like the Wizard of Oz--Ignore the man behind the curtain!  So I trust, and usually take, Money Man's  advice on re-balancing my portfolio because, Lord God!  No one wants an unbalanced, bi-polar, schizophrenic portfolio!  

All that balancing usually leads to the existential question: What is money for?  I don't mean the money it takes to make your house payment and buy food, or put your kid through college, or keep you in a nice nursing home.    I mean  the money that, if you are lucky, might be left over.  Some folks, like Money Man, think that all extraneous funds should go into...well, funds.  

I on the other hand, think funds like that should fund fun.  Money Man and I have had this discussion.  His young whippersnapper intern who was running the power point,  had not heard my views on this.  We had just finished discussing the fact that both Ken and I have very well-hidden chronic illnesses, the kind that Hallmark likes to make movies about.   The talk had turned to funding a fun fund when whippersnapper said something to the effect that I should be investing more of my fun fund in unfunfunds--I looked him in his yet-to-wrinkle eyes and said "I can't go to Paris in a wheelchair".  Note that I said this with the same look in my eyes that I used to give a first grader who had just gotten on my last nerve.    But I really am not satisfied with that.  I wanted to say so much more to him.  How dare someone whose teeth aren't as old as my fillings pronounce judgement on my choice of making memories over making another buck.  

Granted, it is a fine balance and I know how lucky I am to have to make that balance work.  I also know how hard Robert worked, and I've worked, and Ken works, to make sure we fund funds and pay the bills and take care of our families.  And when that is done, I'm buying shoes, taking Katy to Paris, flying to San Francisco for a sweet kiss from Sophie, and holding Ken's hand when we fly to New Zealand...just for fun.