Yesterday was lovely with sun and unseasonable warmth. Gracie and I had some errands, but first I wanted a bit of fun shopping. The store, though, was closed as was the candy store beside it where I could have salved my disappointment with a bit of chocolate, my panacea for any ills or low spirits. Sadly I was left with utilitarian shopping for dog food, cat litter, bread and eggs. I did buy a cupcake, a chocolate cupcake, which raised my spirits.
Today is dark and damp, the air perfectly still. It is not the sort of weather which tempts me to go out or even to get dressed. I will make my bed and pay my bills and consider it a day well-spent, yup, well-spent.
I remember learning about money. The worksheet had drawings of pennies, nickels, dimes and quarters. I guess the 50 cent piece wasn’t important or the nuns thought we could figure it out by elimination and, if that didn’t work, by reading the coin. The worksheet was filled with math problems using money. What coins would you use to add up to 12 cents, 28 cents or 30 cents? I, who never liked math, enjoyed the coin problems. They were more like a puzzle. What coins would you give back if the person gave you a quarter for a purchase of 17 cents? Even though that was real math, subtraction, you still had the puzzle of which coins. For a long time after that I always counted out my coins one at a time from one hand to the other. I’d say ten cents for the dime then eleven cents, twelve cents and on and on when I added pennies. When I was older, I got an allowance of 50 cents a week, always a single coin.
Most birthdays I got a dollar in my cards from my aunt and my grandmother. That opened up a whole new can of worms. Counting money got just a bit more complicated
