Try as I might, I’m having a very difficult time imagining how one can spend upwards of $54,000 on a child monthly. But I’m sure it’s possible if you put your back into it. My husband and I spend thousands of dollars yearly on our children’s athletic endeavours and we think we are certifiably nuts. Our entire family’s clothing budget, per month, runs around $400 (including months of no clothing and months of snowsuits) so the $3,000 monthly figure for one child is positively entertaining. What do rich people do all day? Shop?
Accuse me of delighting in the misfortune of others, but this piece of courthouse news from this morning’s Ottawa Citizen made me laugh. A nervous laugh. Far from diminishing the great toll that marital breakdown can exact on people, there is a business case to be made for earning 10 million dollars for the dubious achievement of having been shortly married to a wealthy businessman. 10 million PLUS $100,000 PER MONTH! For that kind of money, I’d be willing to put up with a lot of marital strife. Don’t get me wrong: in the amount of time — roughly 8 years — normal marriages get long in the tooth (even loving ones), Mr. Potter had had 2, producing 3 children. The guy cannot be easy to live with. But if I wasn’t already married, and if I didn’t believe that we marry once, especially when children are involved, I’d say “Sign Me Up!” I mean, how many sucky jobs don’t pay that well? Most people don’t have the privilege of getting rich while being unhappy.
I laugh at the adults but the children make me cry. Because while the grown-ups are arguing over the necessities of life such as a pied-a-terre in Paris or a house in Rockliffe Park, and what will the girls wear on their trip to the Galapagos if the court doesn’t uphold the clothing allowance, the children are stuck between adults who need a judge, a third party, a stranger, to decide for them where their own children will go to school. Stuck between two grown-ups who need a third party, a stranger, to tell them what the best interest of their own children is. Money can’t buy happiness. And it sure can’t buy good judgment.
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