[19900219:1936b]{...[WBW][continued]}[19th February 1990]

 [Redbook7:69-70][19900219:1936b]{...[WBW][continued]}[19th February 1990]

.1936

[continued]

What with this,* and finding we can eat for £30 - £40 per week** instead of the £100+ p[er] w[eek] [W] had been spending, (making paying-off debts impossible), my attitude to wives and families has taken a bit of a knock: don’t treat your wife as an equal partner in financial matters (domestic or commercial), because however smart and reliable she is on her own (and mine was pretty good), once she’s got small children her judgement will go up the pipe. It’s your job, not hers, to finance the nest, unfortunately; her instincts are simply to feather it. That doesn’t mean she shouldn’t work: just that she shouldn’t control the budget.

***

The significance of all this is that when we came here less than three years ago we had £[...] in capital as well as our house; now we just have the house, and no significant increase in capital items (about £1,000 worth, I guess): and we are still in almost as much of a shambles as when we arrived. Undoubtedly, this is due to my previous unwillingness to manage [W] and the family, wishing as I did to keep the focus of my mind on C[ircles] A[nalysis] & S[ynthesis], etc.; but it has cost us dear in security, for we have virtually no reserve now against large repairs etc., which was the situation I had always determined to avoid. Deciding not to worry about money**** didn’t help: we simply got through the little that was left in even larger lumps.

The only solution would have been to control it, and [W], whose money also it was, which would have meant revising my judgement of her judgement, and dominating her, that much sooner. Outer Circle with a vengeance.

*[See last previous entry]

**[[Redbook7:36][1990[0]203:1043]{House repairs}[3rd February 1990],] p36

***[These are, obviously, untenable generalisations, made presumably in the heat of the moment]

****{(Last year, I think)}

[continues]

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