Money isn't everything, but gee..try doing without it.

A faculty member here tells students not to select a career based on the amount of money to be made, but instead on what makes him/her happy.  There is some truth to that.  However, I have noticed that people who say that money isn't everything tend to be people who have never had a serious lack of it. 

I grew up working class.  My dad did not have a high school diploma, but did have a good blue-collar job that put food on the table.  We always had enough to eat, with Mom cooking it.  On some occasions we could splurge on hambergers.  Mom made my clothes.  But there was no money for many "extra" things.  We didn't have a phone until I was 13.  The house we lived in had no insulation, and there was a hole in the wall in the living room that went all the way to the outside.  There was no air conditioning, but we did have fans and something called a "water cooler" that was essentially a box in the window with a fan on the inside and a woven straw mat on the outside.  The garden hose was hooked to the mat, to keep it wet.  So, the air coming in was cooler than the outside air, at least a little. 

I had no money.  I had no allowance, and no opportunity to earn money from chores, or from any other source.  At Christmas, I was given about $5 from which to purchase gifts for others, but nothing for myself. I can't complain, since I had food, clothes, shoes, and the other necessities, but as I grew, I did feel the lack of funds. 

When I was about 13, sitting in a Sunday School class, I heard some very exciting information.  Our Sunday School teacher told us that his neice (note:  neice, not nephew) had just graduated from college and obtained a job as a computer programmer, earning $13,000 a year.  This was a lot of money in 1964.  It was more than my father made.  And, it was earned by a girl.  A girl programmer!  At that moment in time, I decided I wanted to be a girl programmer!  I had no idea what a computer was or what a programmer was, but that did not deter me.  I wanted that $13,000!  

Later, I saw a picture of a computer.  In hindsight, I think it was an IBM 360.  It showed a person sitting at a kind of a desk below a big panel of blinking red lights.  I thought it must be something like a giant pinball machine.  I had never played pinball (you have to put in a quarter, and I had  no quarters, and no way of getting any) but I had seen other people play pinball, and I thought I could probably do it. 

Later, of course, I learned about computers and programming, and found out it was nothing like pinball, but I did enjoy it.  But, I got in it for the money.  Money isn't everything, but try telling that to the bank that has your mortgage.