DIY sabbatical #3

The real money dirt

[New subscribers: welcome! You may wish to go back to the start of this series and begin at the beginning: first, second, and third.

On a very different note: I have been trying to make my 5 calls along with so many of you, and yes it’s such a puny little gesture, but it’s not nothing. It occurs to me that one tiny thing I can do is to try to honor your efforts on that front, and that at least one of MFA reader might want to have an hour-long conversation about all things money, ethics, investing, saving, life insurance, why I hate crypto, DIY sabbatical, etc.

Happy to kick ideas around, answer questions, vibe with your fear/dread/rage, or give friend-to-friend nonexpert advice. (Or, if you really want to get into it, we can talk politics, never buying Tesla, and my childhood?)

As always, please note that I am not a financial advisor.

But I love talking about this stuff with friends, and if you want to have a conversation about any or all of it, email me at moneyforartistsnewsletter@gmail.com with anything you’ve done lately, big or small, to pitch in and support vulnerable people. Making some phone calls counts for plenty! I’ll take whatever you’ve got, with gratitude! If a bunch of you write in, I’ll put your names in a hat and draw one out. We’ll schedule a phone or video call for a time that works for us both.

Deadline: end of day Friday, March 21.

Thanks!]

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Money in Mexico is just so different.

I am struck again and again by the brute fact of a different economy: a middle-class person from a wealthy economy moves to a poor-person economy and becomes, effectively, a rich person. Not like actually rich—our house here is big but kind of funky, I get a little stressed when we eat out at real restaurants instead of at (very cheap) puestos and fonditas, and like everyone else here, we are in fact poor compared to actual rich people—but relative to, for example, one of our family’s Spanish teachers, who could only think of one restaurant to recommend because she just… doesn’t eat at restaurants. She can’t afford to.

Another example: Our landlord is a retired lawyer. His wife is an architect. In the United States, a lawyer/architect combo is, ipso facto, a sophisticated and well-remunerated pair. Our landlord, by contrast, is often seen sitting on the sidewalk eating the same 20-peso gorditas as everyone else who gets them for a mid-morning meal. We have a collection of his old CDs and broken weightlifting equipment. He gets anxious about which of us is going to pay for a monthly cylinder of gas for the hot-water heater and the stove, which costs 600 pesos / 30 dollars. I think he’s pretty rich compared to his neighbors. But it’s not “rich” the way we think of it in the United States.

I was talking to the homie John about all this when we first got here. He’s traveled a fair amount in Mexico and said something very poignant that has stayed with me, something along the lines of yes, sure, it’s terrific how affordable life is here, and also, it feels bad. You are constantly aware of the fundamental unfairness of wealth distribution: by merest chance, I was born in a time and place that, with a little effort and among many other gifts, has enabled me to travel internationally for six months with my family and not have to work a job during that entire time.¹ Fam, that’s crazy! That’s an ungodly amount of privilege! Meanwhile, the daily minimum wage here is 278 pesos and 80 centavos: less than 15 dollars U.S. for an entire day of work.

All of which is to say, again, I’m not going to cry about it. Or turn around and go home. But it’s something to be mindful of. Something to be clear about. Something to navigate with humility and respect.

OK let’s get to the real money dirt, yeah?

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We figured we should be able to live well as a family on 1,000 pesos (50 bucks) a day.²

That’s not counting housing, plane fare, fixed costs like phone bill or insurance bill — I can speak to those below.

This was just a rough budget for our daily outlays of cash to buy groceries and necessaries, to eat out, go to concerts, buy new shoes for the kids, whatever.

Clearly, there would be plenty of days that we would go over budget, but we also felt pretty sure there’d be lots of days we’d come in under budget, and that it would all balance out.

That’s proven about right.

For example, last week we took a little trip to San Miguel de Allende, which meant

• bus tickets

• three-day rental

• hot springs

• taxis

• museums

• food and drink

• millions of bags of cascarones for the kids to break on other kids’ heads in hilarious and adorable cascarón wars on the main plaza for the end of Carnival and before the beginning of Lent.

Even in fancy and pricey SMA it was mostly quite affordable (think $12 per person for an all-day pass to the hot springs), but we definitely spent a lot more than $150 for those three days. That works out just fine because over the course of the 70 days we’ve been in Mexico, there have been plenty of days that we’ve just been doing our thing and haven’t spent much beyond some basic staples.

I asked my BAAW to tally all her daily expenses on a random day so we could see what we actually spend.

On Monday, March 10, she recorded these expenditures:

• 1 bag of assorted rolls from “la reina de pan” who is on the plaza each morning slangin’ fresh bolillos like a boss: 6-8 pesos apiece, or 48 pesos = $2.40 🍞

• 1 tamal (which she brought me for my breakfast ❤️) from the tamal guy at the bottom of the alley: 20 pesos = $1 🫔

• 1 nice coffee from the coffee shop she likes: 40 pesos + 10 pesos tip, or 50 pesos = $2.50 ☕️

• 1 baguette and 1 muffin from the best bakery in town: 65 pesos = $3.25 🥖

• 1 can of bubble water from the little joint around the corner: 25 pesos = $1.25 💧

• 7 postcards: 84 pesos = $4.20 📬

• Unknown quantity of chicle for children: 10 pesos = $0.50 🍬

• 1 bag of fruit and fish (2 cartons raspberries, 1 carton blueberries, 1 apple, 2 big fish filets) from the frutería: 305 pesos = $15.25 🫐

for a total of $30.35 USD for the day.

That same day, I recorded my own expenditures as follow:

• 2 cute handmade bookmarks for kids: 20 pesos apiece, or 40 pesos = $2 🔖

• 3 queso-huevo gorditas from the gordita ladies in the alley: 20 pesos apiece, or 60 pesos = $3 🥚

• 1 stack of warm tortillas fresh from the tortillería: 20 pesos = $1 🫓

• 1 big bag of produce (1 honeydew melon, 2 mangos, 3 limes, 1 bunch bananas, 1 carton blackberries, 2 carrots, 1 onion, 1 bag flor de junio beans) from the frutería: 255 pesos = $12.75 🍈

• 1 ten-peso coin apiece to the littles for “Musical Money Monday”³: 20 pesos = $1 🪙

• 1 round-trip airport run with a driver to pick up my dad: 1000 pesos = $50 🚕

for a total of $69.75 USD for the day.

We didn’t plan for it to come out so perfectly, I promise—but look at that! If it wasn’t for the airport run, between the two of us we’d have nailed the fifty-dollar goal. And that’s living well, buying whatever food and trinkets strike our fancy, and having the particular luxury of not having to think or talk about money.

Where is the money coming from?

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