Tempering Desire

I'm taking a lesson from the Pope Francis playbook. I am tempering my desires for the good life. Well, I'm trying to temper my desires for the good life. We'll see how this goes.

The pope does not take holidays because the poor don't get to take holidays. I can't find it in my heart to give up vacation, or at least the hope for a nice vacation every now and then. I find myself resentful of people who can afford to go to Tuscany for two weeks or to swim with the sea life in the Galapagos Islands. My husband and I hope to spend two weeks in Greece for our twenty-fifth wedding anniversary, two summers from now. That will require careful saving, planning, and Vinita doing quite a bit of freelance work. I'm resentful that many Europeans get a month off, that this is the norm, whereas in the U.S. we have to earn our vacation time, one day at a time, for every so many years of work. The Europeans understand that down time is important to quality of life. Here in the independently minded, capitalism-obsessed USA, we are too hung up on being productive and thus we shortchange the quality-of-life aspect.

I understand why the pope does not go on holiday, but I don't think I can follow his lead in this. Maybe I should be willing to become willing.

However, lately I've decided to relax more about other matters that have caused me anxiety through the years. Such as having a nicer kitchen countertop or floor tile that doesn't show dirt so badly. Such as redoing the bathroom altogether because the rehabbers who sold us the house did a cheap, shitty job. Every time I take a shower or brush my teeth, I see the plaster coming loose because no one thought to install an exhaust fan and eventually the humidity and steam did their damage. I have to remind myself that at least I have running water, hot running water, and water that is drinkable from the tap, and the means to pay the water bill. And a toilet (well, one out of two) that works.

For years I have had this long list of things about the house that I hoped to fix or change. Not all of them are expensive, and some of them are necessary for the longevity of the house itself. But I'm going to stop being nervous about it. Somehow, we'll make the bathroom repairs we need, but I hope not to spend hours and entire weekends scouring the world for just the right tile or fixture. I won't buy the nicest material because it looks stunning; I'll buy what we can actually afford.

And I will settle down to the fact that, given our finances, it will take years to fix everything that needs fixed, and that's all right. We just need to prioritize according to the most necessary.

To a lot of people, this post won't seem significant. Some will gloss over it because they don't have the financial restraints I have--when something breaks, they just get it fixed and write the check. Others will read this post quickly and with little thought because they just don't understand how someone could become so upset over countertops and tile. Well, I have that nesting instinct; home is my base of operations in every way, and showing hospitality is important to Jim and me. So it makes sense that we want our physical home to be clean and attractive and welcoming--and there's nothing wrong with that.

But if I go through my days with a true consciousness of those in this world who are in great need, how can I not temper my desires for nice things? How can I spend days and days of time worrying about color schemes or the best mattress?

And, frankly, I have a cozy, flower-speckled back yard and a lovely big porch, which means that I can vacation quite nicely at home sometimes. I may need holiday for the health of my soul, but not a luxurious, weeks-long, out-of-country one on a regular basis. One of my former high-school classmates posted last year that she had decided to do all of her vacationing in her own region of the country, so that her vacation dollars would help the economies closest to home.

Maybe because we're getting older, Jim and I don't feel the compulsion we used to, to try out every new restaurant that comes to our attention. We don't need to eat out so frequently--not that we ever needed to. For one thing, we try to eat more simply and frugally these days, for dietary and budgetary reasons. And we have let go of any vision of ourselves as hip, cultured people. I think I wanted to be considered cultured, years ago. Now I just want to be wise. And more tempered in my desires.