Materialism and "upgrading" our lives

Along similar lines of today's earlier post, Jim Martin has written insightfully on how subtly our standard of living escalates. Here's a quote from his post, "You May Be Richer Than You Think:"

In general, I don't think we notice. I don't think we notice that little by little our standard rises. If it happened all at once, it might be a jolt. No--it is slow--acceptable--reasonable--gradual.

Exactly. Jim does a good job of showing how easily we fall into "upgrading" our big-ticket items of consumption: house, car, etc. I don't think he goes far enough, though, at least in this essay. The real extravagance of middle-class, U.S.A. standards of living lies in the things most of us never give a thought to: $9 movie tickets, clothes at Wal-Mart, Sunday dinner at Cracker Barrel, $25-a-person meals at Applebee's, impulse buys in the grocery-store check-out line. One blessing of not having much money the past few months is to see how very, very frivolously I, like most of my neighbors, spent it when I had it. I pray that if God ever gives my family that kind of money again (e.g., something left over after paying the mortgage and buying food), that we make it count for something.