Our family owns a piece of land up in northern Wisconsin. On it, we have a privy; you know – an outhouse. We have indoor plumbing in our cabin; but, we’ve kept the outhouse in the event we have a large group of people visiting and if our one ‘indoor’ bathroom is occupied. This is a story learned from an outhouse from my father’s youth.
My father who is now in his mid-eighties shared a story with me some years ago about a time when he was just a youngster about the age of nine. And he remembers it was the only time that he ever received a spanking from his grandmother. It was a time when things were simpler, and also when you had to be very frugal. So without any indoor plumbing, grandma and grandpa had an outhouse out back. Also it was a time when you would go into town and purchase fruit that would come in either a wooden box or a crate. They would come home and individually un-wrap each piece of apple, or pear, or peach that came surrounded by soft tissue. Grandma would take that tissue, put it in a box and take it out back to the outhouse.
Well, this is where the story really begins. One day my father needed the use of the facilities. Shortly thereafter, grandma also visited the outhouse out back. That’s when she came back to the house very angry which met her hand to his bottom. Why? What had happened? Well, the soft tissue paper that had been left out in the outhouse was for company. The family was supposed to use the Ward’s Catalog.
What’s the story here? It’s about frugality. If you want to plan a trip, don’t take a home equity loan. If you want stuff, don’t put it on a credit card. Save for the future. Do with what you have today, so you can use the pleasure of having soft tissue paper tomorrow.
