Golden Years

No, not really.

I was the oldest of two children living in a single parent household. My mom and dad split when I was just under four years old, my brother was two,  and we lived in a modest two bedroom apartment in a blue collar town.

It was the late 60's (1969 to be exact) and my mother could not work due to our ages and not having a good option for daycare at the time. My grandmother and aunt lived a few towns over and they loved spending time with us and some of my most cherished memories are spending time in the summer at their little bungalow on a lagoon. We would swim and crab every day off of the little "floating dock" and she made the most delicious pasta with the crabs that we caught.

We all enjoyed those summer nights after dinner playing games and eating those little Drake's Coffee Cakes with a cup of tea. At home, we were not allowed sugar (no soda, no candy) except on special occasions like our birthday or during Holidays. My go-to cake for my birthday was a homemade "ice box cake". Basically, it was chocolate pudding, graham crackers and bananas layered in a glass Pyrex dish.

My mother loved to bake and cook and also was really good at sewing. She would buy material and those little packs of sewing patterns (Butterick?) and make my school clothes every year. All of them were sets with pants and a little vest. My "signature look" in grammar school that is memorialized in all of those school pictures. Good times until I got to sixth grade and most everyone was wearing jeans to school and sneakers. How could I play dodgeball in my fancy polyester outfits? That is when I would sneak a pair of jeans with me and change at the bus stop before getting to school. I really wanted to fit in.

As I have looked back at my early years, I see how everything happened for a reason. The summers at my grandmama's bungalow were set up so we had some place to go since we did not have money to go on family vacations. The "no sweets" rule wasn't because it was unhealthy for us. I mean, who in 1969 was talking about how sugar wasn't good for you? We didn't have packaged treats and soda because they were added expenses. It was much more economical to buy a bag of sugar and flour and some eggs and bake our own treats. The little chocolate chip cookies my mother made were so much more delicious than anything store bought (including a bakery, these cookies were award winning in my book!)  The clothes? Yup, we couldn't afford back to school clothes so my mother made the clothes so we looked clean and put together for the school year. My grandmama, aunt and uncle would buy us shoes, socks and underwear to help out. I remember going to the department store with my uncle and he said I could buy any shoe that I wanted. I picked the red suede Puma sneakers and wore them with EVERYTHING. Didn't matter if they matched (and really, they never matched anything I was wearing, lol), I wore them until the holes appeared by the toes.

Public assistance was available so we always had food on the table and like I stated previously, my mother was a really good cook. The things she did with leftovers.....  Leftover mashed potatoes and corn? Corn fritters!! I loved these things! Stew for days and pasta on Wednesdays and Sundays like good little Italians. Friday was "no meat" day so we did get a plain cheese pizza every Friday which was a special treat. Looking back, my mother did an exceptional job of making sure we had all the necessities. She explained that we were taking public assistance but that we would be "paying it back" once we were able. I had no idea what that meant but it made me feel good that we were being helped now and would pay it back later. I was glad to hear it was not a permanent condition. I had dreaded the days of going to the local supermarket to buy food and pulling out food stamps to pay for it. The looks received ranged from disdain to pity and I sometimes would bring my own savings (we got .25 cents a week for doing chores!) so people wouldn't look down on me. It made me feel ashamed. I never felt that way at home, only when I was out and ran into friends. I hid this from all of my school friends at all costs.

I also learned "budgeting" at a very young age. My mother did this thing with envelopes in the freezer. Each envelope had something written on it--- "rent" or "utilities" or "special occasions" and she was diligent in putting money in each envelope and always paid our bills on time. Things I took with me as I moved into young adulthood and helped shape my thoughts about money, responsibility and saving for the future.

My mother called me a "little miser"when I was growing up. I saved just about all of the money that I made doing chores and got my first job as a papergirl delivering the local paper on my bike. My brother, on the other hand, was super generous with his money and would give it away or pretty much spend it on himself or others as soon as he got it. My brother went on to become a priest. My dream was to be a millionaire and I set that intention when I was 11. I never wanted to be reliant on others or the government. I never wanted the "stares" or demeaning words from being on public assistance/Welfare. Of course, that was absolutely necessary as we were growing up and saved our lives as we had a roof over our head and food on the table but I wanted to ensure that I always lived within my means, made sound financial decisions and also gave back to those less fortunate.

This is my story of heading towards being Financially Independent and Retiring Early. (FIRE)