Is LifeTogether allowed to have rants? Ooh-- maybe I will be the first poster who contributes a rant! So... let's get started. This is an excerpt from an e-mail I sent to 2 dear friends today.
I get asked about once a week what I'm doing with my life and the future. And I'd have to say, I really don't know. There are a dizzying number of choices, and I just want to be sure and make the right one before I've plunged into it. I want to live a rich, fully lived life, not a life of misery with glorious beach vacations for 1 week of the year. I've been thinking a lot about what the best kind of life is. And I'm still not sure. But here is my current thought. I would love to know what you think.
I don't want to be a professor or a teacher or a counselor or an office worker or a retail sales person or even a writer. At least, not right now.
I want to be tired. Like good, hard work tired. I am so sick of sitting around! I want to knead bread and feed chickens and hoe a garden. And when I have dessert, I don't want to totally take it for granted. I want to enjoy it because I spent hours baking this cake or making these popcorn balls with people, and it was hard work, and I only have dessert sometimes, not like 10 times a freaking day! ...and because I *actually* deserve it... aka "dessert". I want to live life at a steady pace, without a clock-- not this thing I have now where I alternate between boring leisure and grueling hurry.
Ugh! I am just so sick of my life and myself and all this damn 'leisure' and meaninglessness! I know it sounds like I'm ungrateful, but all these "labor-saving devices" just make life really pointless because you finish your day's work in like a minute and then you feel empty and realize how meaningless your life is and watch like 6 hours of TV and then you feel worse than when you started out. I'm entertained to death. I'm almost read out. I think I just need a good dose of hard work and some kids and other people around me to bring that tangible fulfillment to things.
And I've been reading about France, how they lowered the workweek to 35 hours, and I just don't see how people in America average a 46 hour workweek! It's unbelievable! It's not that I don't want to work, but office work is just so banal! I want to be outside! I would love to do an office job for like 20 hours a week max and earn my money, but after that, I am just so done it's not even funny.
*Aaaah! I miss sunlight!*
I want to live on Walton's Mountain or in "Sarah Plain and Tall", where they get up at sunrise and cut each other's hair and take care of horses. I want to meet real people that sweat and make up songs and like watching the sky. I want to play a board game where we spent hours making all the pieces out of wood and drawing the board onto sheets of paper that we then laminated. Or play with cards where we had fun drawing the Jacks and Queens and Jokers.
Am I just rambling, or am I making sense? All these so-called improvements to our life-- yes, many are good. But so many just make our existence into a sham because we live vicariously through them and are distracted by them. We are so overstimulated that we don't live in real relationships with real people. Gah-- I need to go read some Wendell Berry.
2 comments:
when i was a roofer for a few summers, i came home so tired and sore... i drank probably a half-gallon of chocoloate-protein-powdered-milk when i got home every day. i remember saying at the end of the day that it was pretty satisfying work.
then when i had to get up at 5:30am, i cursed rooftops everywhere.
i'm actually quite satisfied with my job, even though it's sedentary... although i do stand up at my desk all day, and go for a swim 2 hours after lunch.
anyway, that's my experience.
i dare say rants are allowed, even encouraged.
A few things...
1. I want to plant a real garden in the coming year year, and it will be a lot of work. We can have a co-op garden together, I'll provide the space and the time to it. I'm serious.
2. This has nothing to do with farming but it's interesting. I want to turn the shed in my backyard into a dark room, and that would be a lot of work, is anyone interested in developing film as a hobby?
3. I think you should read about this place: http://koinoniapartners.org/index.html
The history, the mission, and the work these folks do is really inspiring. Maybe you'll find something useful. Also, i ordered the documentary about their community and I'll let you borrow it as soon as it arrives. Please turn the sound off on your computer when you visit the site because the music scared me when I first visited.
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