I didn’t know everything cost $700

Jennifer Ditlevson Haglund

Because I don’t want to blame myself anymore, I will blame it on the rain just like Milli Vanilli. I chose an apartment of an inconvenient location for public transit, and now it’s too late to take it back.

It was raining, I’d liked everything I’d just seen, and I was soaked. That is why I didn’t flinch when the broker told me that if I lived there, my family could take the bus to the train. It didn’t occur to me that it would be a hassle or an extra fare because I just wanted to get out of the downpour and into the cab.

Despite this blunder, there are many good things about my new digs that still made it the best option of what I had the opportunity to view on my short trip to New York.

When problem solving, I remembered a man on the train who raved about the wonders of foldable bicycles. I’d never heard of them, so I did my homework. The cheapest and most reliable model I could find was $700. It could pay for itself after six or seven months. The bike could be a good investment, but that’s a lot upfront.

While I was thinking about transportation, I remembered that I have a toddler and my strollers are made for the suburbs and small towns — not cramped trains or city sidewalks. On an online forum for New York parents, I asked for suggestions about compact, lightweight but sturdy choices. Several women provided links for my consideration.

After viewing the fourth luxury umbrella stroller and watching its accompanying 3-minute demonstration video featuring svelte white mothers drinking lattes, I temporarily forsook the hunt. Some of these things were, you guessed it, $700.

For that much, that stroller better have self- and child-cleaning capabilities, or at least a gold-embossed monogram.

About gold, my husband’s birthday is coming up, and he likes nice pens like I do. Maybe I could get him one of those Mont Blanc fountain pens. They start at about $700, right?

I don’t live in that world, and I don’t imagine that I’ll enter it once I move to New York. Most people don’t. It’s an expensive city, but 2015 data reveal that the median annual household income there is $60,850. Removing homeowners from the equation, it’s about $41,500. For perspective, the national median income is $51,939.

What this means is that throwing $700 around to buy strollers, foldable bikes, and fancy pens isn’t normal, or at least not typical. Most people who can’t afford to live close to the train must get up earlier to walk, and parents who can’t get an extravagant ride for their kids either avoid going too far from home or use whatever they have and hope it doesn’t break.

Money is a crazy thing. I still don’t understand economics. I can’t process how a pen can cost the same as an entire month of rent for a two-bedroom house in a Midwestern town. A designer leather jacket could buy two years, two months, and eight days’ supply of the name brand diapers. For a lot of children, that covers everything from birth through toilet training.

I wrote that I didn’t understand economics, but I have one part figured out. When consumers have the time and money to search for, purchase, and then recommend the “right”

stroller, it’s likely they’ve bought the lies of marketing. Blurring needs and wants can be justified in the name of quality or durability. It makes people feel good to think they have high quality gear, almost as if ownership is a virtue.

But it’s not. It’s just stuff, and $700 can do so much more than cart your kid around town in style.