'There' Is No Better Than 'Here'.

'Here' is a pretty good place.

I heard the most wonderful interview on the radio last week of a couple who had fled Pakistan and started a new life in Canada. In Pakistan, they were well-paid professionals, lived in a beautiful house, drove fancy cars and had servants to take care of them.

In Canada, they learned that their international experence counted for nothing. They took whatever jobs they could find, and now live at the poverty level in downtown Toronto.

And they are the happiest they have ever been. As the woman said (I paraphrase): "Now we don't have to keep up with the Jones'... because here, we don't know anyone." And they laughed, the most infectious, joyous sound I had heard out of the radio in quite a few days.

My husband and I were in our car, and as we listened to them, we fell thoughtful. You see, we'd been out car shopping all morning, an experience probably responsible for more relationship crises than just about anything else, and I was upset that the car I coveted was beyond our reach. My husband was upset that he couldn't afford to buy me what I wanted. Then we heard this couple on the radio, and while I can't speak for my husband, I was ashamed of myself.

I was upset over a car.

A car.

How stupid.

So today I stood in the sun and washed the 13-year-old car we make no payments on, which still runs, and which we can't seem to beat to death with a stick. And I told myself to be grateful for what I have and stop griping about what I don't have.

 I know a lot of people around here, you know, but not a single one of them are called 'Jones'.