Karly

There’s a trend doing the rounds at the moment in which people are sharing the five things they think are worth the money and, naturally, I started making my own mental list. My first instinct was to raid my bathroom cabinet because, if there’s one thing I have become unexpectedly opinionated about over the past year, it’s skincare. I could quite happily make a case for a handful of moisturisers, spend far too long discussing the merits of one foundation over another or defend the existence of expensive shampoo with more enthusiasm than is probably reasonable. It seemed like a fairly safe assumption that my answer would involve five rather beautiful, rather expensive products.

The more I thought about it, however, the more that assumption began to unravel because the purchases I value most aren’t the ones that sit prettily on a shelf or arrive wrapped in tissue paper. In fact, none of them have very much to do with beauty at all. They’re the things that have quietly worked their way into my everyday life to the point that I no longer think of them as purchases but simply as part of the furniture, the sort of things I would replace without a second thought if they disappeared tomorrow because life would be noticeably less enjoyable, less convenient or, in some cases, considerably more complicated without them.

Before anyone points out the irony, yes, I am well aware that I have written at length about the increasingly commercial nature of journalism and the internet’s apparent inability to discuss anything without trying to sell it. Fortunately for me, this isn’t journalism, nor is it an attempt to convince you to rush out and buy an iPad or the nearest printer. If anything, writing this piece simply made me realise that the things I’ve found most worthwhile are deeply personal. You might disagree with every single item on this list, and that’s rather the point. “Worth the money” isn’t an objective category; it’s simply a reflection of the sort of life you enjoy living. These just happen to be the purchases that have quietly shaped mine.

It also struck me that conversations about whether something is “worth the money” tend to focus almost exclusively on the object itself, when I suspect we’re usually paying for something rather less tangible. Sometimes it’s an experience, sometimes it’s the time something gives back to you, sometimes it’s knowledge that you carry around for the rest of your life and, occasionally, it’s simply the relief of making adulthood that little bit easier. Looking back over my own list, I realised it says rather more about the sort of life I enjoy living than it does about my spending habits, which felt like a much more interesting place to begin.

Performance tickets

The first is performance tickets, and I don’t think I’ll ever stop buying them. There are very few purchases that become more valuable with time because, unlike almost everything else we spend money on, a performance can never be recreated exactly as it was. You can watch a recording, listen to a soundtrack or read the script itself, but you cannot recreate the atmosphere of sitting in a theatre as the lights go down, nor can you bottle the peculiar feeling of hundreds of strangers collectively holding their breath at precisely the same moment.

When I think back to the performances and literary events that have stayed with me, I remember almost nothing about what they cost. I remember watching Kenneth Branagh in King Lear. I remember a delightfully rainy evening in Regent’s Park at one of Allie Esiri’s Shakespeare events. I remember spending the day at The Queen’s Reading Room Festival and listening to Helena Bonham Carter read poetry with the sort of warmth and conviction that reminds you why literature is meant to be heard as well as read. It’s one thing to admire an actor’s work on screen and quite another to watch them bring a poem to life in a room full of people who have all willingly given up a Saturday simply to celebrate reading. None of those memories begin with the price of admission. They begin with where I was sitting, what I was feeling and the conversations I found myself having afterwards. Years later, I couldn’t tell you what any of those tickets cost, but I can still picture those days with surprising clarity, which seems to me a rather good return on investment.

Education

Education was another easy addition to the list, although perhaps not for the reasons people usually expect. We tend to reduce education to qualifications and careers, as though the point of studying is simply to acquire a certificate before moving on to the next stage of life, but that has never quite reflected my own experience. Looking back, what I remember most are the people, the places and the stories.

Choosing to study languages has given me far more than the ability to communicate in another tongue. It has introduced me to literature I would otherwise never have encountered, encouraged me to live abroad, allowed me to navigate countries that once felt intimidating and, perhaps most importantly, taught me that every language offers its own way of seeing the world. None of that came particularly easily. There were essays I thought I’d never finish, deadlines I was convinced would defeat me and moments when moving halfway across Europe seemed like an unnecessarily ambitious thing to have done. Yet those challenges somehow became the stories I enjoy telling the most, and the friendships I made along the way have lasted considerably longer than the stress ever did. If someone asked me whether it was worth it, I don’t think I’d hesitate before saying yes.

Physical media

The third is physical media, which I appreciate may sound faintly old-fashioned at a time when almost everything can be streamed, downloaded or stored in the cloud. The older I get, however, the more I appreciate actually owning the books, records and films that mean something to me. There is something deeply reassuring about knowing that a favourite novel will still be sitting on the shelf exactly where I left it and that a beloved film cannot quietly disappear because a licensing agreement expired overnight. My shelves have gradually become less of a storage solution and more of a record of the things that have shaped me, each spine reminding me of a different season of life, a different obsession or a different version of myself.

My iPad mini

My iPad mini has earned its place on this list simply because I use it so relentlessly that I scarcely notice it’s there anymore. It has travelled with me across countries, spared me from carrying far heavier books than any sensible traveller ought to attempt, become my preferred way of annotating articles, interview notes and scripts and quietly established itself as one of the most useful things I own. It isn’t the sort of purchase that inspires dramatic declarations of life-changing brilliance, but I do think the best technology is often the technology you stop noticing because it slips so seamlessly into your routine.

A printer

Finally, a printer, which is admittedly the least glamorous recommendation I have ever made on this blog. It is also one that has repeatedly justified its existence. There is an undeniable satisfaction in being able to print customs paperwork, return labels, theatre tickets or the occasional document that stubbornly refuses to enter the twenty-first century without having to embark on an unexpected expedition to the nearest print shop. It isn’t exciting, and nobody has ever rushed to tell me how envious they are of my printer, but it has quietly removed countless small inconveniences from my life, which is perhaps a greater achievement than many far more exciting purchases can claim.

The funny thing is that, having spent the better part of a year developing rather expensive taste in skincare, I hadn’t chosen a single serum, moisturiser or lipstick after all. Instead, I seem to have chosen experiences that became memories, education that became part of who I am and objects that quietly make everyday life easier without demanding very much attention in return. Perhaps that’s the real measure of whether something is worth the money. Long after the novelty has worn off and the receipt has inevitably disappeared, the things that matter most are usually the ones that have become so ordinary that you only realise how much you value them when you imagine life without them.