Saturday, March 24, 2007

It's a sad, sad, sad, sad world

The spring soccer season has begun, and while watching today's game, I learned some disturbing news. The treasurer of our community soccer organization has been accused of embezzeling $100,000 from the club. How desperate do you have to be to steal money from a kids' group? A police officer was quoted in the paper as saying the man is not a bad guy...he just made a stupid mistake.

I don't know why the guy did it, but it did get me thinking about why a person would be that desperate. Lately, I've been reading this book. So far, I really like this financial book, but once I added up our must-haves, it was obvious that were make enough to cover our necessary expenses with very little left for anything else. Which brings me to the question -- how do other people do it?

Our community has been growing like crazy the last few years. I see these big houses going up all over the area. These houses are listed anywhere from $140,000 to more than $300,000. And of course the people who live in these houses aren't driving 10-year-old cars either. So if at the minimum these people (assuming they have children) are living in houses with twice the mortgage that I have and paying at least one car loan, they have got to be bringing in almost six figures to support shelter and transportation as well as other expenses, such as groceries, clothing, dining out and other entertainment. That doesn't sound very realistic.

I try to be as content as possible since we do have a nice three bedroom house and nice vehicles that run (both happen to be nearly 10 years old). I'm not perfect. Yes, it would be nice to have a a bigger house with more room since the three boys share one room, but hopefully that day will come sometime in the next five years.

For now, I am enjoying the time I have to spend with my children and my husband because I am fortunate enough to only work part time. Of course there are days I miss the bigger salary I once had, but that is all I miss. I would much rather work in a place that appreciates me and allows me to have a personal life.

By the way, the soccer game ended in a tie. Anna did an awesome job as goalie, and she was thrilled because she played the entire game since the other goalie was home sick.

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