October 16, 2005

• Liberty, Luxury, and Leisure

  These alliterative values mean a lot to me, although their definitions
  have altered radically for me over the years.  In childhood, for
  example, I highly valued the rare liberty to stay up late at
  night.  Now that I have both the leisure and the liberty to go to
  bed (most days) at any hour I choose, I am more likely to appreciate
  the luxury of being able to turn in early.

  After trying unsuccessfully to prioritize which of the three is more or
  less important to me, I shall take the liberty of declaring it doesn’t
  matter much.  I value them all, none more than the others in the
  long run, but some above the rest sometimes.  For example, in the
  various jails and one prison where I spent a cumulative couple of years
  in my mid-twenties, there were both relative leisure and luxuries such
  as central heating and indoor plumbing that I lack here and now, but my
  current state of relative liberty is preferable to me.

  During my homeless periods before and after prison, I had unlimited
  liberty, but only scant leisure and very little luxury. 
  Currently, family responsibilities, financial constraints, and various
  commitments limit my liberty, but there are some attractive and
  comforting compensations.  Particularly, I enjoy the luxury of
  being on the electrical grid.  For fifteen years, my son and I
  lived off-grid.  The first few years, we didn’t even have our own
  generator.  I would haul a 12-Volt car battery on a sled or in a
  wagon to a neighbor’s house for charging so that we could listen to a
  radio.  When we got a little Toro generator, it was truly a valued
  luxury.

  Running water and indoor plumbing are luxuries we still lack, but we
  have the liberty to walk off into wilderness at our leisure, and the
  luxuries of privacy, clean air, wildlife in the yard, and all the clear
  clean water we can haul home in our buckets from the neighborhood
  artesian spring.  These are luxuries and liberties we couldn’t
  have in any city, some of them not even in the small towns
  nearby.  If I could find a way to have it all, I would. 
  Until I do, I will take the greater liberty of privacy and the luxury
  of the wilderness across the road.

  Some factors in my life are hard to categorize as liberty or
  luxury.  In the 1960s, after I discovered the pleasures of illicit
  drugs, I resented the government for restricting my liberty to use
  them.  Although I still view addiction as a public health issue
  rather than one of criminal justice, having had the leisure to reflect
  on my experiences, I now recognize that addictive substances restrict
  my liberty even more than the law does.  Many drugs are thus
  luxuries I couldn’t really afford even if I were wealthy, while some
  other drugs are now essential to my continuing living.  Thus, life
  itself is a luxury and one for which I willingly trade a little of my
  liberty and leisure in order to acquire my prescriptions and remember
  to take my pills.

  Leisure, at this stage of my life, is perhaps my most problematic
  so-called luxury.  The enforced leisure of ME/CFIDS is in some
  ways even more constraining than that I had in prison.  It taxes
  my intelligence and creativity at times, coming up with non-physical
  means of avoiding boredom and mental stagnation.  Occasionally I
  catch myself resorting to diversions such as video games and DVDs that
  are as damaging to my mental health as drugs have been to my physical
  health.

  I have made a boldface and forceful mental note to myself to beware of
  the videos that Greyfox gives me.  His taste for horror and black
  comedy can leave my vulnerable imagination filled with images I’d
  rather not have there.  Yesterday, I viewed a typically Greyfoxian
  double feature:  Freeway and Six Ways To Sunday–way too much blood and weirdness for me.

  I’m going to try to get some housework done now.  When I run into
  the fatigue wall, maybe I’ll try clearing off my work table and doing a
  jigsaw puzzle, or play computer solitaire.  I will NOT watch Blue Velvet or The Brain That Wouldn’t Die… and I have already put aside unfinished that “excellent” book Greyfox recommended, The Skinner.  Maybe I’ll try it again later, when my psyche isn’t so battered and raw.

  • 1:59 pm
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