Embed Notice

I may have mentioned this somewhere else. My friend George (of blessed memory) used to say that life was 80% maintenance.

I realize now, many years later, that for me, this is wrong. George, bless him, may have experienced this, because he actually had some down time in his daily life, and hung out with friends and family often to do fun and meaningful things. He had some unspoken white male privilege that we just took as read.

None of us seem to have time, money, or energy to do fun or nice things anymore. The group of friends really fell apart after he died.

Life, for me, is about 117% maintenance on any given day right now. I'm serious. I know 117% is impossible, but it's what it feels like. Everything is maintenance. And on mornings like this when I'm having insomnia, it hits even harder.

I was talking with an old friend on Sunday about the monetization of everything, the transactional nature of everything, and he was telling me how a lot of that stems from Christianity. I was trying to wrap my head around the transactional nature of believing in Jesus Christ as the savior. Not having been raised Christian, it's not easy for me to understand, but I'm starting to get it, which means I'm starting to understand this undercurrent in American culture. I'm sure it's similar in other countries.

I mentioned how there are no free spaces to be in anymore. Everything is monetized. The culture of the coffee shop means that you have to spend money to be somewhere. The culture of micro-transactions and monetizing every last bit of your daily life means that there are not free public spaces in which people gather to do things that are not monetized and controlled. One of the last bastions of this freedom is the public library.

It's been a gradual creep, this pay-to-play culture. It's been an intentional creep, apparently as well. Monetizing our every minute has become glorified and captured in the grind. Money and having lots of it is still considered neutral/good rather than the old idea of "the root of all evil", and monetizing every action is considered to be entrepreneurial or savvy or... whatever.

It's not healthy.

Neither is having a life where 117% of it is maintenance and negative however many percent of it is relaxation and fun and actual personal interaction, growth, rest, and enjoyment.

In spite of attempting to step out of grind culture, apparently I am still strongly affected by it. And I have a shit ton of privilege!!! I'm housed, I have a fairly stable income for now, and I have access to good food. I have relative health atm and I am able to invest in that.

But I don't have the same social structure I had when George was alive. There's very little true relaxation. There's very little relaxed interaction with other human beings. And I definitely don't do crowds or parties anymore because of the pandemic.

I miss George. Being around him was relaxing. We got to do fun things like drum circles and seasonal celebrations with our intentional group that we had. We even traveled all together to festivals now and again! I know I lived a very stressed out, insecure life when he was around, but getting to have breaks for fun with him and friends was really good. Maybe my life was only 95% maintenance then. 🤷🏽

Watch the creep, my friends. Watch the creep of monetization and taking away your time. Intentionally resist where you can. Carve out spaces where things are not monetized if at all possible. Make those spaces for other people if you have the means. We're still all in this together, regardless of what lies we hear in popular media or from other people.

George did not lie about maintenance. He did the maintenance he needed to do, and he worked right up to at least 80% of it. Maybe it was part of his own resistance to take that 20% back for himself and enjoy being with his family and friends. Maybe I need to push for that in my own life? 20% would seem pretty damn spacious to me right now.