I stated in a Facebook status message in 2009 that “Everything I need to know I learned from Super Mario Bros.” There is a hint of truth to this. Just like every other ten year old alive in the 80’s, I wanted a Nintendo Entertainment System more than anything. The reasoning here was twofold- one, I just loved playing video games (still do, actually) and two, video games were probably the number one topic among the kids at school. It put me at a social disadvantage not being able to relate to the conversations going on.
I think there were a variety of reasons why my folks never got a Nintendo for my brother and I. We would have fought over it endlessly. My schoolwork probably would have gone downhill. We would have begged constantly for new games. There was also a financial aspect here- a system and games was an expensive proposition for my family at the time. My parents were always very good to teach my brother and I the value of a dollar, and how to prioritize our purchases. This meant that we might not get a Nintendo, but we always ate really, really well. (I just got a craving for my mom’s Spanish Rice). I did eventually save enough money to buy myself a Game Boy, and it, of course, lead to fights and me begging for games. When I consider these fights, the begging and even the frustration of not actually playing the games, there was more suffering than pleasure derived from the device.
Let’s skip past the SNES, and Nintendo 64, and look at the Age of the GameCube. The GameCube came out just before I graduated college. I had next to no interest in owning one, mostly because I was too busy trying to figure out what the hell I was going to be doing when I graduated. I moved to New York in the fall of 2002 with enough money to pay rent for two months and no job. After about three weeks I was able to get a job in a small office, though my salary was just enough for me to pay bills and go to bars where I would try to meet girls that I couldn’t afford to take out. Over the next four years or so, I would keep working at these jobs that paid me enough to live, but disposable income and savings were cherished items, and so anything that I purchased came after careful consideration.
Finally, in the Age of the Wii, I had moved into a line of work that afforded me some disposable income. Finding the justification to purchase a Wii and a few games wasn’t that hard, and so just after Christmas of 2007, I picked one up at Best Buy, and I can assure you the ten year old in me was jumping for joy. I don’t think I could even speak clearly to the cashier when I was paying for it. Two months later and I was bored with it. In fact, I think I went 8 months without playing it at one point, and now it is on loan to my Sister and Brother in law.
It came down to the rush of getting a new toy that you really, really want. Most of the things that we have are just toys in one way or another- satisfying an urge for objects that will enhance our lives, but once the rush of the purchase is over, what do we have left? This experiment my wife and I are engaged in is going to get hard when that urge to buy something really kicks in- There were a couple of things that we bought on December 31st that have yet to get here, and I imagine that once the “newness” of those things has worn off, I think the enormity of this project is really going to hit home.
Because of my limited disposable income in years past, I have learned how to chose what I really wanted, and then save up for it. However, as my earning potential has increased in the last couple of years, I have let myself go a little wild with purchasing things almost on a whim, and part of the point of this experiment this year is to pull myself back to Earth a little and realize that I don’t have to buy things just because I want them.
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