I do not know whether or not I will still have the Saturn by the time this column goes to press. I do know that, if my wife and daughters have their way, it will probably assume a resting place somewhere in the general vicinity of Jimmy Hoffa sooner rather than later. Mind you, even at 13 years old the body is still in relatively good shape, it still runs superbly, and it still gets better gas mileage than any of the other family vehicles.
It is not even the fact that the headliner is falling down and the sun visors will not stay in place that has turned them so virulently against the little gray goose. No, it is the fact that the incessant clicking noise from somewhere in the dash has now added a duck sound to go along with it, thus earning my nickname for it.
For a while it was just the click-click-click-click sound. What made that all the more annoying was that it would not stay in a good rhythm. It would have a Journey “Don’t Stop Believin” rhythm and then segue directly into an “It’s a Small World After All” rhythm. But even that did not prepare me sufficiently
“Clickquack! Clickquack! Clickquack! Clickquack!”
It was my youngest daughter that was riding with me at that moment. We looked at each other and both said, “We have a duck.”
I was hoping that the mechanical duck would leave on his own. But he seems to have made himself right at home in our dash and shows no intention of ever leaving. But I, wise husband and father that I am, had just the right words to say to my irritated family the last time they brought it up:
“That, family, is the sound of frugality. Say that word with me, frooo-gall-iii-ty.”
To which they immediately chimed in unison, “CHEAP.”
That hurts.
I do intend on fixing the clickquack at some point. But right now after tithe and missions and other giving, I have bigger priorities, such as children’s school tuition, tires, orthodontist bills (I am putting my money where my family’s mouths are), savings, debt reduction and the satellite package that allows me to get SEC football on Saturdays. Further, since the clickquack continues even when the blower fan is off, I am perplexed as to what I am dealing with and therefore know that I will likely have to hire help on this one.
And so I choose frugality.
There is a fine line, I suppose, between cheap and frugal, and it may well be mostly in the eye of the beholder. What I do know is that, heretical prosperity gospel notwithstanding, no one can ever have it all, and therefore everyone has to make choices. Call it cheap, call it frugal, but anyone who does not carefully make good choices will have bad choices foisted upon them.
In Luke 14:28-30 Jesus said, “For which of you, intending to build a tower, sitteth not down first, and counteth the cost, whether he have sufficient to finish it? Lest haply, after he hath laid the foundation, and is not able to finish it, all that behold it begin to mock him, Saying, This man began to build, and was not able to finish.”
It is called budgeting. A frugal budget is not a set of chains to enslave you; it is a set of bolt cutters to free you. The vast majority of the marriages in trouble that I counsel are stressed and falling apart due to poor financial management. What I try my best to help them grasp is that budgeting is the key to fixing that problem and that a person willing to live like others will not live now will be able to live like others cannot live later.
Even if it means having a duck in your dash in the meantime.
Bo Wagner is pastor of Cornerstone Baptist Church of Mooresboro, North Carolina, a widely traveled evangelist and the author of several books available on Amazon and at www.wordofhismouth.com. Email him at 2knowhim@cbc-web.org.