Covetous

The house behind ours was recently sold and renovated (it was already pretty nice), and the new owners held a birthday party for a child this afternoon. I noticed the decorations earlier, and then when Cook and I were out in the backyard wrassling with the grape arbor,* we realized that they had a full-on inflatable bouncy house set up. Dutch didn't notice it for a few hours, but when she saw it, she cried "No fair! They have a bouncy house!" That's a classic Dutch response - anything anybody else that she wishes she had is automatically NO FAIR. I gave her a mini-version of the Not Fair/Vincent Test lecture she's heard a billion times before.**

Later, she and Skipper and I were out in the yard watering the plants with the water from the wading pool, and listening to the really-fun-sounding party on the other side of the fence. We worked quietly for a few minutes, and then Dutch said firmly "Well, we have a better life than theirs."

I laughed, because I had just been thinking along very similar lines. Their house is very nice, you see. And I've been feeling really covetous of all sorts of things lately, and very poor. My response to other people's enjoyment of their Stuff is to grumpily scramble to inventory the ways in which I can still feel superior to them. I am completely ungenerous and don't in any way celebrate their pleasure of their Stuff that I wish was MY Stuff.

We talked about it a little, and the conversation wound up with Dutch happily listing all the things SHE has that she's pleased to have. "And I have LOTS of books! And... I have LOTS of BLOCKS! And... I have THREE swimsuits!" - I tried to redirect her into a more zen state, but it was hopeless, probably because of my notable lack of zen-itude. Dutch and I are maybe not very good people. No matter how much we do the Vincent Test, or remind ourselves of how unbelievably fortunate we are, we still want your Stuff for ourselves.

* Cook and I both thought that grapes were sort of delicate and finicky plants. Turns out they're really, really not. Cook is worried the grape vines on the north side of the house might break the next-door neighbors' bedroom windows and strangle them to death.

**Vincent is a kid featured in one of the excellent, earnest DK books she owns - he lives in rural Rwanda, is an orphan, and is raising his brothers and sisters. Is it fair that Vincent has such a hard life and other people have such easy lives? Is your Not Fair problem as substantial as Vincent's? If it is, then it has passed the Vincent Test, and you're allowed to complain.