I had this manager, we’ll call him Marco, who had done reasonably well for himself as a mechanical engineer. He grew up working class in Italy, moved to the US and worked for a solar company that did well. But at some point he married the daughter of a MegaTech VP and thus married into a lot of money and adopted an inflated lifestyle. So here we are, working together at a struggling clean energy startup- neither of us is making very much.
One day he asks me if I’d like to join him for lunch, I reluctantly say yes, because have a feeling he’s going to want to pick the fanciest place in town instead of the cheap deli next door. On the way to the restaurant in his new car he mentions something about how living in the Bay Area is so expensive and how he can barely afford his daughters daycare.
“So, how much is daycare anyway?”
Marco: $2000 a month, it’s crazy!
“Yeah that’s nuts!”
M: I know, I’m just trying to make it work with other expenses like vacations and playing polo.
“Oh, you play polo? So you have a horse? (in the fanciest part of San Fran??)”
M: Well, in order to play polo you need at least 5 or 6 horses.
“What? Really??”
M: Yeah because there’s like 5 rounds and your horse gets tired after each one, so you need to switch it out for a new one after each round.
“Wow, well boarding all those horses certainly can’t be cheap!”
M: Tell me about it! But I’m pretty frugal (sensing my astonishment), my horses aren’t ultra fancy like everyone else’s at the club, mine are only like $30,000 each, but yeah I just have someone else take care of them. Anyway, I’m just hoping we can afford to go on vacation this year like we always do.
“I suppose you don’t have to go far, there are a lot of cheap places to travel in the US that are pretty cool.”
M: (condescendingly rolling his eyes) When we go on vacation it’s AT LEAST $25,000. I like to take the whole family sailing in Europe.
Sometimes you just have to facepalm and move on.