But That's Math...

Ah, summer. The season of visiting pretend towns with your family. I’m personally familiar with such pretend towns, having grown up close to Old Sturbridge Village, where colonial-garbed women spin wool into yarn and a blacksmith perpetually hammers away at a new shoe for his horse. You can tour the old homes and purchase quills and ink at the general store. I even went to summer camp at one of these old-time setups and learned how to churn butter. This summer, these old fashioned villages will surely be brimming with girls such as Milena, who one year saved up her money for months to dress as a girl from the 1700s.
   Milena was explaining one day at lunch about her family’s upcoming trip to Colonial Williamsburg, Virginia, and about how you can rent old fashioned clothes there. Milena was saving her money and although she wanted to buy some other things, was putting those on hold until after the Williamsburg trip. She was very serious about those colonial dresses. She listed off the money that she had saved--$8 from Tyieshia for her recent birthday and $5 from Becky--and explained there was still five weeks of allowance to be had before the trip. I asked how much, then, she would have total with the birthday cash plus allowance. Milena looked at me as if I had asked an absolutely ridiculous question that she couldn’t possibly be expected to answer and said, “Well, that’s math, so….”