She sold a frivolous thing she wasn't using to buy herself a horse, when she likes to ride and is living in the country with stables, fodder, and labour available at essentially no cost. That seems a perfectly sensible expenditure, unless you wish to argue it's not sensible for her to ever spend any money on herself when she could save it for emergencies.
That's a good point. And it's true that I don't get the feeling Mrs. Marlow spends a lot on herself, so maybe she was due for a treat.
I'm conflicted about it, to be honest. I think it's buying both at the same time that I object to, perhaps not logically. It's more of a visceral objection to the thought of one of her children being left out.
I'll offer a rough analogy - I went to a quite posh school on a scholarship, and by the time I turned seventeen, a lot of my friends already had cars. My parents, meanwhile, couldn't afford to pay for driving lessons. The childish part of me thought that if my Dad had given up smoking, he could have paid for driving lessons for me; while actually I knew that it wouldn't have been fair or reasonable to expect this. But if my brother had gotten a car, or driving lessons, while I were still told I couldn't have them, then the whole thing would have seemed a lot more unfair to me. Does that make sense?
I just feel bad for Lawrie in this situation, not so much because Ginty ended up with a horse and she didn't, but because everyone else ended up in a position where they could hunt/go riding easily. I think in my (admittedly much smaller) family, even if my mum had bought herself a horse, she probably would have let me ride it if I'd wanted to, during the holidays at least; as Rowan did for Peter. It's entirely possible that I was spoiled though! ;)
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2005-08-30 05:46 pm (UTC)She sold a frivolous thing she wasn't using to buy herself a horse, when she likes to ride and is living in the country with stables, fodder, and labour available at essentially no cost. That seems a perfectly sensible expenditure, unless you wish to argue it's not sensible for her to ever spend any money on herself when she could save it for emergencies.
That's a good point. And it's true that I don't get the feeling Mrs. Marlow spends a lot on herself, so maybe she was due for a treat.
I'm conflicted about it, to be honest. I think it's buying both at the same time that I object to, perhaps not logically. It's more of a visceral objection to the thought of one of her children being left out.
I'll offer a rough analogy - I went to a quite posh school on a scholarship, and by the time I turned seventeen, a lot of my friends already had cars. My parents, meanwhile, couldn't afford to pay for driving lessons. The childish part of me thought that if my Dad had given up smoking, he could have paid for driving lessons for me; while actually I knew that it wouldn't have been fair or reasonable to expect this. But if my brother had gotten a car, or driving lessons, while I were still told I couldn't have them, then the whole thing would have seemed a lot more unfair to me. Does that make sense?
I just feel bad for Lawrie in this situation, not so much because Ginty ended up with a horse and she didn't, but because everyone else ended up in a position where they could hunt/go riding easily. I think in my (admittedly much smaller) family, even if my mum had bought herself a horse, she probably would have let me ride it if I'd wanted to, during the holidays at least; as Rowan did for Peter. It's entirely possible that I was spoiled though! ;)