Tuesday, I was standing in an aisle at Walmart checking out the meager supply of photo paper so that I could try out the new photo printer I knew I’d be pulling out of the box as soon as I got home that night.  I was standing near a former student who now works full-time in the electronics department while he spoke to what sounded like an old friend.

“I’m glad I bought that land this winter.  It’s gonna get so bad, a guy’s gonna need to have land.  I can just stay on it and have my own business doing something out there and live off the land.”

Remember, I live in a rural area.  We’re set up a little differently here–lots of people have land, and although I don’t think it’s that cheap, it is cheap enough that people with pretty low-paying jobs are able to buy significant amounts of it.  Well, significant in T’s view, considering he grew up in the suburbs measuring lots by feet instead of acres.

I know that people are getting nervous about gas, and that may be an understatement.  Most of the people I know look at this as a sign that bad, bad times are ahead.

You know what?  They might be, but I’m not going to worry about it.

My grandpa lived through the depression.  You know what he said?  

“Don’t ever worry about that.  No one else had anything then, either, so we didn’t know any better.  We just kept going.”

And I know, it will be hard for those of us who know what it’s been like to live in a time of relative prosperity–prosperity we still have, I might add.  You have to look at it in another way, though.  All this money and all those things haven’t made us happy; instead, they’ve gotten us so stressed out in slaving to afford them, half of us need pharmaceutical intervention to survive the week.

It’s time to take account of all that’s really precious to us–and for me, that’s T, J and the rest of my family–and remember that they’re the ones that count.  In the end, love doesn’t cost a thing.