SomeNetBlog

Minnie’s Towels

Posted: November 15, 2008 1:37 pm by n4ofa
Filed under: reflection

I remember so clearly Minnie telling me to go downstairs and look in her cedar chest and get her towels that she had been saving. I was her caregiver now that she was bedfast, and I could not seem to keep up with all the washing of bedclothes and towels.
No telling how long she had been saving those towels.

It is now nine years since she died and I am now using those towels.

.69 cents for a towel from Parks Belk, she must have had those a long time, saving them for when she really needed them. “Minnie’s Towels” have a lesson for us, especially in these uncertain economic times. I keep thinking of her working in that dreadful, awful job at the Kingsport Laundry, never missing work, earning less than $6000 a year in her best years. Unbearably hot work, ironing shirts, no air conditioning, her face beet red from the heat in the summer, but she never missed work - like she said, “I have to work!”

If you notice in the picture, the towel is not the plushest most expensive towel, probably the cheapest, it was what she could afford.  She would take a little from each paycheck and pay on her lay-aways, if she wanted something that is the way she got it, “Pay as you go, don’t owe anybody”.  Don’t spend more than you can afford, plan ahead, save something, don’t spend everything you make, put something away for hard times. Don’t buy everything you want, save and when you have the money in hand, then buy it.

I know she bought two cars for my daughter Emily, helped Alex out with a large loan for his Saab. She put a transmission in one of my old cars, and when she got sick she had money put away for her “hard times”.

She was one smart woman, I learned much from her and I really miss her.

Thanks for the use of your towels, Minnie!