What are you going to put in a modern-day piggy bank? E-transfers? Bitcoin?

It seemed like the perfect gift for a four year old.

It was a piggy bank. A piggy bank in the shape of a dinosaur.

And not just any dinosaur, but the marquee player of the Cretaceous period — a Tyrannosaurus rex. I swaggered into the birthday party confident in my perfect offering.

It turns out that, to a preschooler, a gift of a piggy bank is the equivalent of giving a teenager a rotary phone. A novelty receptacle for the coins of currency? Matching tea towels might have gone over better.

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After all, what are you going to put in this piggy bank? E-transfers? Bitcoin? I’ll tell you what a modern piggy bank should have. It should have a tap feature. That would go over a treat. Mark my words, having just now suggested the idea, you’ll soon see such a thing.

So, I’d stumbled into another “Uh-oh” moment in life. I’d failed to recognize just how rare cash has become in our society. Times change. When I was a kid, I would slyly appear at my parent’s cocktail parties with my piggy bank tucked under my arm. I’d pull out the plug from the bottom of the bank unleashing a torrent of pennies, nickels and dimes. Act Two of this presentation was to arrange the coins into denominations. This was a well-calibrated performance. I knew some acquaintance of my parents would find this childish act of accountancy charming and would ferret a coin or two out of their pocket to add to my savings. I can still recall Mr. Wright adding several quarters to my pile. I knew well enough to thank him effusively while my fiendish juvenile mind added up my bounty.

Coins were a big part of childhood, and piggy banks provided a........

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