I’m a big fan of the budget, which Planners euphemistically call a ‘œcash flow plan‘. I’m not rigid about it but I like to have a reasonable, conscious target to meet in all the various categories. Last October, a beautiful cat dropped into our lives and blessed us with her presence until we lost her by way of a hit and run driver in March. She had been abandoned and she was an Abyssinian, a rare and expensive breed. When she decided that she would make her home with us, we made some guesstimates as to care and feeding of a cat (neither of us had ever had one) and added a line item to the budget. What else do you do when fate sends a gift?

Just before Easter, we started to think about bringing cat energy back into our home. We had felt our family (originally just the two of us) expand to include this creature and we missed that sharing and loving exchange. So we made our first visit to the local no-kill cat shelter. That itself is an experience for a completely different post!

This time around, we were making a decision and not simply accepting lucky fate. I found myself thinking about the budget and began considering the monthly number multiplied by 12 multiplied by how many years do cats live? I had to stop. I knew if I took the calculation too far I might never adopt a cat. Good thing too because after bringing home our Easter Lilly (her real name) and listening to her cry all night for a week, we decided that the thing she needed was a kitten. Back to the shelter we went and home came Lola. I did revisit the budget and upped the monthly number but I was wise to stop there. Probably best not to know.

I think the same could be said for buying a house in many places in the country. The biggest obstacle to our making a home purchase in our newly adopted state of FL is the fact that I’m a Planner and from a pure numbers perspective, it makes no sense to buy. We’ve both owned homes in California where the numbers at the time really did make sense. For us here now, it really would have to be a pure lifestyle decision’¦much like adopting pets. Sometimes it’s really not about the money.

Photo credit: Lola and Lilly by C. Deex