In January, I started a new project called #ExactChange which involved trying to pay for all of my personal spending using only coins. I had a complicated system where with my family expenses, I was using cash, and for personal expenses I was using coins, then I had bills that I paid online, which I could not pay in coins… I made it almost 2 months before I had to put it aside. I even traveled to London and spent only cash and coins, but the complicated accounting with expenditure columns for family, travel, personal, bills, etc.. were pretty difficult for me to balance both figuratively and literally.
My friend Tom has an MBA and he tried to help me set up a paper ledger. When I asked him if everything had to be exact down to the penny he asked “Your project is called Exact Change right?”.
So today is August 18, 2018 and I just received the first installment of my Virginia Museum of Fine Arts 2018/2019 Fellowship Award and have decided to restart Exact Change in an effort to better understand our relationship to money and spending. In an age of frictionless transactions and app based virtual currency, Exact Change seeks to rephysicalise the way I spend.
In my past attempt at this, it did indeed slow my spending down and made me very aware of what I was spending and where. As were the businesses I was frequenting…. They suddenly had to figure out what to do with all these Sacagawea coins in thier registers. (Sorry Lamplighter!)
Another thing happened in round one of Exact Change. I stopped buying shit online. I deleted all the items in my “Save for Later” que on Amazon and was able to find most things locally. I live in a city, cities sell stuff, and cash is king. I did run into a few hiccups, like the coffee shop in NYC that doesn’t take cash only Apple pay and Credit Cards. My friends bought my coffee.
Currently my framework for the project is to spend every cent of my VMFA Fellowship in coins, which will be dutifully accounted for down to the penny.
Wish me luck… let’s see if I can beat my 2 month record.
JDF
