Today, when I went to the bank, I was treated differently, ushered into an adviser’s cubicle. I shuffled the money between new accounts on their app while we talked. It almost felt like a game. He ordered a new card for me. Don’t wave it around, he said.
When I came out, a man was sitting on a sleeping bag by the cashpoint holding a cardboard sign. I went to evensong, and as I stood and crossed myself, part of me thought about how much to invest in shares. If I were a good Christian, I thought on the way from the Cathedral to the Boar’s Head, I’d give this poison away at once.
In the pub I meet friends I know are struggling: carers on shit wages, people on disability benefits, divorced men. Let me get this one, I say, but they refuse. Sometimes people with money come in; we can tell. They look around with an easy air, like the people I grew up with.
I’ll keep it to myself for now until I can figure out what it means. But am I not secretly making up my mind? Doesn’t part of me already relish this new hoard?
Realistically, it’s not that much, serious people might say. You have no assets, no career to speak of, no pension. You’re still renting and your income is approaching nil. You might live thirty more years. What happens when you get old? Care homes are a grand a month. Get some compound interest and live your life.
In religious life, you become more of a hypocrite, not less. You become aware you’re play-acting before powers you don’t understand – that you’re in the lowlands of religion. Safer to stay in the middle ground with one foot in this world. I’m chastened again by the Lord’s sayings: ‘Woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation.’
I feel the need to talk to Giuliano, a priest, someone wise. But I’m not sure I want wise counsel just yet.
Notes from a Room 