A Woman Can’t Be Too Rich, Too Thin or Have Too Many Toys Stored in Her Basement

“A woman can’t be too rich or too thin.”

Nobody knows who said it first. I’ve been crediting Jackie Kennedy Onassis with that bon mot, but AI now tells me it might have been Babe Paley, the socialite, or Wallis Simpson, the wife of the of Duke of Windsor, who abdicated the British throne in order to marry her.

Whatever its source, I interpret the maxim to mean that, in some circles, the richer you are and the svelter you are, the more accepted — and happier? — you must be.

Super Rich, Super Thin

Super rich and super thin are not among my aspirations. I can manage with what I’ve got. But the phrase did cross my mind the other day as I contemplated an upcoming visit from the grandkids.

A woman can’t be too rich, too thin — or have too many toys stored away in her basement.

If the grandkids were coming, I reasoned, I needed to be ready. I would need toys.

I went downstairs to check on my toys. And there they were, neatly stacked in the basement storeroom, which they share with the furnace, the paint cans, the Christmas decorations, and the back-up ink cartridges. They’ve been down there since Peter and Christina went off to college twenty-five years ago.

A Woman Can’t Be Too Rich, Too Thin or Have Too Many Toys Stored in Her Basement

Some people — including my kids — might think these are Peter’s toys or Christina’s toys. I don’t. They are my toys.

I bought all these toys, after all. I lugged them home. And once I got them into the house, I looked after them. I kept the puzzle pieces sorted and the Duplo separated from the Lego. I made sure the doll house furniture furnished the doll house, and not the stick and mud hut out in the front yard.

As the children outgrew the toys, I sorted them into bankers boxes and labeled them. Now, if a grandbaby or neighbor baby, pays a visit, not a problem. I pull out the bankers box labeled Baby Toys.

The baby is now walking and talking? Grab the Preschool box.

The grandniece wants to paint? She has four bankers boxes of art supplies to choose from.

Well you might wonder how I came by so many toys — twenty-three or so boxes in all. It’s all explained in a story I wrote about my sprawling toy collection back in 1987, when I was the mother of two young children and my toys were my dirty little secret.

My Dirty Little Secret — I Can’t Say No to Toys

By Barbara Falconer Newhall, June 6, 1987

SOME PEOPLE can’t resist chocolate. For others, it’s clothes. Some folks, oddly enough, will spend $110,000 on a Ferrari with no back seat and hardly any trunk. Imagine that. For me, it’s toys. As a consumer, toys are my weakness . . . .   Read more.