When we were raising our kids, the BIG word was FREE. Because we had about a decade of scrimping along, we never had the extras that a lot of people take for granted. Our kids grew up with paper routes at an early age, to earn money for clothes and amusements. They were always hustling with eachother, trading clothes, finding ingenious ways to stretch their resources.
I remember one Halloween, Ruhiyyih dressed up her two younger brothers in her old costumes - Rahmat used her Oreo Cookie costume and Taraz went as a Maid, with the little black dress and apron with white ruffles. They went to extremes to conserve their resource.
My kids wrote for things, sending stuff off in the mail, when summer simmered down in a slog of boredom. Rahmat wrote to Nintendo offices up in Redmond, WA, with an "Envelope Art" drawing and some suggestions for game strategies. And, he got the most fantastic response back - a personal letter from Greg Wallace, the Game Play Counselor. He said, ' Way cool envelope art, dude!'. The real treasure here is that Rahmat now designs intricate games on his own website - amazing what a kind letter of encouragement can do.
I remember one day something came in the mail for Ruhiyyih - she couldn't have been more than 12 years old. It was a free sample that she'd written away for. It came in a white package, no decoration other than lines drawn to make a bow. I was curious about it, wondering what would be in an unmarked package, and I did what any snooping mother would do - I opened it. Inside was an "Attends Brief" with new Perma Dry Protection, fits 32-34 hips, medium, with instructions for wearing standing or bed-ridden!
She started at age 10 filling out all the Sweepstake forms from Readers Digest and sent them in, hoping we'd win the 6 million dollar prize. I never filled them out, because I thought getting rich would spoil our life. It would rob my kids of the delightful inventiveness that I saw as they tried to figure out how the world works.
Ruhiyyih comes to visit today, and she will look in the piggybank I keep on the windowsill for her - all my loose change. I've got some holiday coupons from stores with free gifts - Bath and Body Works, Victoria Secret, Domino's pizza, and a $7.00 carwash. I save these for her. And, this last week she gave me a $10.00 coupon savings at the Jiffy Lube for my oil change. If you were to talk to her, she'd tell you about all the ways she saves and collects little treasures along the way. Funny, when she tells me about it, she is always giggling and laughing, like she was still that 12 year old child, ready to get a grip on her world.
