What’s in a word?

Anybody who reads this blog will likely notice that I avoid using the words “tightwad” and “cheapskate,” even though two of my frugal heroes -- whose writings I include in my frugal bible -- use those words to refer to either themselves or their writings or both. But much as I admire Amy Dacyczyn, author of "The Tightwad Gazette", and Jeff Yeager, the "Ultimate Cheapskate", I just can’t bring myself to use words that carry such negative baggage.

I prefer the words frugal and thrift, whether you’re talking about an act or a person or a movement. In fact, I like to use the plural form of frugal (there isn’t one, I made it up, though I probably wasn’t the first) to refer to people who examine the economic impact of their actions: Frugals. I just like the sound of it.

The hulking 2,662-page dictionary my husband got me for Christmas a few years back, Webster’s Third New International Dictionary, supports my intuition on this word-choice issue.

Here are the definitions it lists for these four words, presented in alphabetical order:

cheapskate -- first entry is “a miserly or ungenerous person” and “one who tries to avoid his share of costs” Lists this quote by Frances W. Browin: “If we were courageous enough to demur at the price we were made to feel in no uncertain terms that we were cheapskates.”

frugal -- “economical in the use or the expenditure of resources“; “not wasteful or lavish”

thrift -- believe it or not, the first definition listed is “healthy or vigorous growth.” Definition No. 2: “good fortune, success.” 3. “savings accumulated through frugality” 4.a. “careful management of financial affairs” It’s not until definition 4-b that a negative connotation arises, “stinginess, miserliness”. But by definition No.5, it’s back to positivity: “Gainful employment, useful occupation.” (There’s a definition No.6, but it’s a reference to a specific type of plant that’s n/a here.)

tightwad -- a person who spends, lends or gives away money grudgingly or not at all; a close or miserly person.

I should note that this dictionary’s copyright date is 1993. It would be interesting to see if the definitions of these words have been updated in recent years to account for the many “frugals” who have tried to take ownership of them and expand their meaning. Yeager, for instance, may well be the “Ultimate Cheapskate,” but he advocates charitable giving and other admirable, earth- and people-friendly acts in his book, “The Ultimate Cheapskate’s Roap Map to True Riches.”

A new beginning

I returned from our annual family trip to Tennessee last month with a powerful urge to restart this blog, abandoned last spring when I suddenly found myself immersed in a project that, in hindsight, would’ve gone much better if I’d taken advantage of this outlet.

But I was having blog-concept issues as well. I knew I wanted to explore, and try to emulate, thrift found in nature. But I was limited by my knowledge of those processes in the natural world. All I could think of was water finding the most efficient, economical path to lower ground.(And we saw plenty of examples of that on the trail; water never sits still on a mountain.)

The other problem was that I wasn‘t entirely comfortable calling myself a “natural thrift.” I mean, I’ve known for a long time that thrift is a part of who I am, but I’ve had a years-long conflict of how I dealt with ‘fessing up to it, knowing that many people interpret frugality as stinginess. And sometimes it is. I’ve certainly struggled with that on this Odyssean journey that began 15 years ago with the decision to be a stay-at-home, homeschooling mom.

But frugality can also be a thing of beauty, like in nature, or in math. And all too often, in the past, the pride generated by what I perceived as a triumph of economy would dissolve into shame when exposed to the gaze of a “non-believer,” if you know what I mean.

I think I found some clarity on this latest foray into the Great Smoky Mountains. It’s too early to say whether I found my own fossilized backbone, perhaps misplaced years ago on an earlier hike up these same trails. But that’s how it feels.