Keeping up with the Joneses

This email recently came up on our town's preschool email group:

HI All - What does the average family in Lexington spend on their child for Christmas?  We moved to Lexington recently and I want to know what I should spend on my kids so they will feel like they are getting about what other kids are getting.  I was just curious.  I used to spend about $1,500 each kid.  Is it about that here?  Thanks,

I have so many snarky comments I'd like to write back, none of which I have the time to tone down and sound nicer about so I will just put my thoughts here. Plus, I still want to make friends around here so I didn't write back. But here are my first reactions:

• ARE YOU KIDDING ME?
• If you moved to Lexington recently, I'd hate to see where you just moved from.
  
• YOU are the Joneses that other people talk about trying to keep up with. 
• Here is your chance to be above average. Waaay above average.
  
• I don't even know how to spend $1,500 on my kids. Unless it's college tuition.
• How about spending more time as opposed to more money? Lots of kids love getting that.
• If your kid wants to feel like they're getting what my kid is getting, then give them a bunch of toys/games/books that I dug out of my gift stash, some of which were already given to them once but they never opened and forgot about.

Thank goodness ALL of the comments written back were like mine, but said with a much nicer and more gracious tone. Nobody wrote back saying they also spent $1,500, most everyone as surprised at her email as me. One or two people said they spend around $500 (still more than I've ever spent) but after disclaimers or justifications.

What was more disturbing than the $1,500 comment was the "I want my kids to feel like they're getting what other kids are getting comment." Sure I fall into the trap of comparing ourselves or my kid to the folk around us. But my mom was constantly telling me "you don't have to be like everyone else" while I was growing up, all while I was telling her the alligator on my shirt had to be pointed in a certain direction (I forgot left or right) or else people would knot it's not a REAL Izod shirt or asking for a Cabbage Patch doll like everyone else. So now, when I catch myself comparing, I can often hear my mom's words buzzing in my ear. I wonder what her children hear buzzing in their ear?

And I try to be real with myself, like when we buy a brand name -- is it really for its quality rather than to impress others? And who knows, we could also be a sort of "Joneses" -- Lord knows our kids have more than enough toys and stuff. Just because I don't spent $1,500 doesn't mean my kids nor I are any less subject to consumerism (we've been get consumerism out of our kids' heads all throughout Advent/Christmas).

But this email was one of the more blatant examples of "keeping up with" the Joneses I have ever seen. After one of the room parents in Tobey's class bought $150 worth of gift cards for our teacher for Christmas, I was starting to worry that I did live in a $1,500 town. Glad people here can be reasonable (and nice about it) after all.