In "Year-End Blowout," the owner of a car dealership is upset that his son is getting a divorce. He doesn't care that his son is leaving his wife for a man. ("Some people like manuals; some people like automatics.") Rather, he is upset that his son's actions leave the dealership open to a financial drain by his soon-to-be ex-wife.
In "Turn Down," Buzz's first night as a reserve officer, the groom of a disrupted wedding doesn't care that his prospective wife slept with an ex-boyfriend: "I slept with him too!" Instead, he gently reminds her, "Today is about our
future, about looking ahead, about building a home for ourselves while
constructing whole neighborhoods for other people."
People who find these reminders of financial gain crass--how dare people care about the practical elements of survival?!--remind me of the eighteenth-century disdain by the upper classes towards professions that made money, so upper-class lawyers had to accept "gifts" rather than send out bills.
I, however, appreciate the reminder that life keeps functioning at the "what will I pay for this" level. After all, what does money represent if not people's ethics and goals and desires and personalities?
