To celebrate my boyfriend’s birthday, I surprised him with boarding passes to a bedroom on a train. Once we had explored our little room and giggled and marveled, I made him wait in the coffin-sized bathroom while I unfurled an entire soiree from my suitcase. I strung white lanterns, draped fancy fabric over the seats, put down place settings, set out the food and a bottle of wine, and put his gift in his chair. The wee atmosphere I had created transformed the tiny space.
After dinner, we curled up together under the swaying lights and sipped wine as the train horn blew and the lights of towns and farms and factories rolled by outside our second-story window. It was, in a word, perfect.
If this were a lifestyle blog, I would have accompanied the above story with a smattering of darling pictures full of polka-dot ribbons and neat handwriting, and that would be it. But I don’t want that to be it.
I want to be more than my own dollhouse.
I even think I have an obligation, as a human being, not just to try to be more, but to tell you about it here, even if that’s uncomfortable for both of us.
With the life I’ve lived, I might as well have been shot into outer space, climbing into a gleaming rocket and offering that grubby cluster of open-mouthed kids a salute before I took off. I have enjoyed beauty beyond what any of us could have imagined when most of my friends were prying switches from trees in the front yard and peeling off their leaves while the adults stood in doorways, waiting to wield the weapon on its weeping deliverer. I once swam in the pool at the top of the Tokyo Park Hyatt (better known as the Lost in Translation hotel) while the sun set around me. And then there was the gigantic Jacuzzi tub in New Zealand, the one with my breakfast plate balanced on its edge and the gorgeous view of sheep-dotted hills rising up outside its window. And that dinner in the enormous square, at night, in Spain, with all of its balconies and the hundreds of dioramas behind them—some partially shuttered, some flung wide open for all to see. The hotel in Chicago where a maid delivered freshly baked cookies in the afternoon. The first-class suite on the airplane to Los Angeles, where I had my own bed and my own little salt and pepper shakers.
These are extreme examples, of course, rare and unusual gifts or perks that I never could have afforded if I were footing the bill. But that’s the thing about cultural and intellectual privilege: people start giving you advantages that the poor don’t have access to. The dynamic of life favors you more heavily without you noticing, because it doesn’t occur to you that the doorman doesn’t offer the same expression to everyone.
Even in my ordinary life, I’ve funded plenty of my own smaller, more common indulgences, whether I paid for them with cash or time: lattes, salon visits, gym memberships, throw pillows, cupcakes. The kind of indulgences that arrive topped with whipped cream or in a pretty box. The kind that almost anyone I’m likely to associate with can and does routinely afford, even as most of us lament how broke we are. The kind we barely recognize as indulgences at all, because not everyone can afford to choose the color of their walls.
I just wanted to be happy. No matter how much money you have or what you spend it on, I’m sure you do, too. Almost all of us have assumed, correctly or otherwise, that our happiness is the point, or that our children’s happiness is the point.
My life experiences have certainly not been fruitless. I was happy. I am happy. Hell, I’m often drunk on a complex cocktail of profound gratitude, enjoyment, wonder. I’m not here to present my life or yours as meaningless. I’m not discounting our search for beauty, our ability to foster tiny joys by way of coat buttons or key hooks. At least we are joyful. Plenty of privileged people aren’t, choosing instead to exist in a state of astonishingly steady outrage, paired with an amusing but unflattering air of disbelief, as if the rest of us climbed onto the bus to utopia this morning and left without them.
So, no. None of us are monsters. Many of us have used the significance of matrimony as an excuse to spend more money on one evening of our lives than it would have cost to buy my brilliant childhood friend an entire associate’s degree at the community college. But we still aren’t monsters, not really. That’s how complicated this is.
We do make choices that we don’t recognize as choices. We do use “need” in a way that would baffle or disgust anyone still stranded in my old stomping grounds. Some of our bucket lists don’t have a single item on them that isn’t about getting something we want. Some of us don’t even realize alternative options exist, because we have, often with the best of intentions, made universes out of ourselves.
But I think we could be more. I think we could climb out of our own stories if we realized our allegiance to those narratives, our servitude to that photo of a kiss at sunset.
Listen, I get it. I once slept in an $800 hotel room in Tokyo. I understand. I just want to be more than my own life. I want to walk out of the dollhouse and make stories that aren’t about me at all. If you want to be more, too, we should talk about it. If you don’t, the rest of this series is probably not for you. I’m not looking for a fight, I’m not interested in making you feel guilty, and I’m not here to convince you of anything you don’t already know. I just want to be more.
32 Comments
Yes, I understand where you are going & I’m eager to see what you have to say.
I try to remind myself that anyone who has more than 1 day’s food on hand is rich in this world, where half the people don’t have that luxury.
But at other times, all too often, I can’t seem to help hurling myself off the cliff into the ocean of senseless materialism, over and over. One more necklace, because I don’t have one that color. One more electronic gadget. Another bottle of $15 locally produced extra-virgin first harvest grassy olive oil (that was today. It gave me a twinge but I did it anyway).
I want so much. Not necessarily material things, but I am so greedy for experiences. I want to see the ocean in Bora Bora when I haven’t even put my feet in the ocean that is a mile away for months, maybe a year.
Yes, let’s take this trip.
Can we be best friends already? I love this. I think about this all the time: I scroll through Pintrest and come up with ideas to make my own life so much better, prettier, neater; yet, what I really want is to make things that make the world better. I don’t know how to do that, how to be that, really. But I want to try.
Amazing post.
Beautiful post.
I’ve only just worked out the difference between “I want to have more” and “I want to be more”. I’ll be following your blog with interest!
thanks for accurately expressing almost everything I feel about my own wants/needs/yearnings. i’m excited to read more.
I’ve been reading your blog for a while now; I can’t remember how I found it. I am glad I did, and just wanted to say hello. I appreciate your honesty and your prose. I can’t wait to see where this is going.
Yes to everything that’s already been articulated and to everything that you alude to …
Beautiful and sweet and sad and lovely and true… I try to remind myself every day to be grateful for all that I have, even as I struggle. Your post make me remember how lucky I am to be in a position to quit the job working for the boss who makes me miserable without having a plan because I have a safety net. I have so much more than I deserve. Thank you.
It’s a weird culture that has evolved from our riches. We benefit from the efficiency of scientific advances which have polluted our environment with chemicals and then we spend our money fighting the complicated diseases of the first world (obesity, diabetes, cancer) instead of meeting the simpler challenges of the third world (starvation, malaria, AIDS?).
My sister got cancer so I will pay for organic produce, coddled meat, and natural beauty products. I handed over $700 for my blender and donated $200 for famine-relief in Somalia…
I don’t know the right answer but I do think about my choices and as you say, try to be more than one of countless agents in the economic transfer of wealth from the poorest to the infinitely more wealthy. But I believe I probably will not succeed in any significant measure.
I want to BE more too. And trying to figure out how is proving much more difficult than I thought. Hoping I can join you on your journey…
I’ve been thinking about this post for a couple of days, now. I wanted to respond, but didn’t know what to say, exactly.
I’ll I’ve come up with is: YES.
Yes, yes, yes.
Having just finished reading “The Geography of Happiness” by Eric Weiner this post really resonates with me. Thank you for sharing!
I find that I’m much more willing to give away money to help the less fortunate (10%) than time, as I can always make more money. However, giving time is always more rewarding (as it gets an experience that accompanies it!). I assume you’re going to write about time here, so I’m on board.
As a former English teacher who used Robert Newton Peck’s “A Day No Pigs Would Die” as part of the curriculum, I have assimilated this quote into my life: “Need is a weak word. Has nothing to do with what people get. Ain’t what you need that matters. It’s what you do.” I wholeheartedly agree with the paradox you describe…I am both guilty of “having and wanting” yet seek to do more with my life.
Thanks for giving this food for thought. I look forward to your next offering.
Yes. Let’s please talk about it.
“But I think we could be more. I think we could climb out of our own stories if we realized our allegiance to those narratives, our servitude to that photo of a kiss at sunset.”
I feel like you pulled these words out of my mouth, or maybe it’s more that I’ve attempted to express this precise sentiment more than a few times and seemingly failed in eloquence and execution, but in any event: YES. So with you on this, friend. So with you.
Love, love, LOVE this – yes, please – more, MUCH more! Your writing is like a laser beam.
I want more. I want SO MUCH MORE, in exactly the same vein you outline here.
Thanks, guys. I’m excited to hear that this is important to people. Now I just have to, erm, figure out what we’re doing next! But we can just fill the awkward silence by pumping our fists in the air emphatically a bunch of times (and I do have some ideas).
So glad to read this. It is important, and it is uncomfortable, and it isn’t easy. I talk about this shit all the time anyway, mostly because I’m obsessed with it, and can’t stop myself. *Emphatic fist pump* Looking forward to reading more.
We all want to be more. Some of just don’t have quite as clear a notion of what we mean by that as you seem to.
Well written. And inspiring. Thank you.
I want to be more too. Write on… I’ll be reading.
Well, you KNOW I would have taken a smattering of darling pictures full of polka-dot ribbons and neat handwriting, because that’s what makes me happy, but that doesn’t mean I don’t want to be more than my own dollhouse too. Really looking forward to hearing more.
I love this post and I am so glad that you are back here and writing again. My favourite blog is yours, I frequently come back to it. You once sent me, upon special request, the piece you wrote about the death of your cat. I shared it with my friend and it helped her a lot. So thank you. I enjoy your writing very, very much. H
Quoted this on fb:
“At least we are joyful. Plenty of privileged people aren’t, choosing instead to exist in a state of astonishingly steady outrage, paired with an amusing but unflattering air of disbelief, as if the rest of us climbed onto the bus to utopia this morning and left without them.”
Thanks for knocking it out of the ballpark.
Count me in too. This is something that, at times, consumes me. I’m glad I’m not alone.
Please write more in this series! Two and a half years of unemployment (my partner’s) has been a life-altering experience. Somehow I am now someone who both gets manicures and saw a loved one almost accept food stamps. It is complicated and I look forward to your essays. Your site is always a pleasure, especially when I need a break from the LOOK WHAT I BOUGHT corner of the internet.
Wow and yes. I feel like you have written what I have felt for a long time but couldn’t put words to myself. VERY much looking forward to the next installment. I am IN!
I’m in.
Yes. Yes and yes. Count me in and I will be following along. I only feel good about indulging myself when I remember how this is just that. An indulgence that reminds me there is so much more to be rather than have.
Love this.
Can’t wait for more. Reading your post, and the comments of your readers, made me feel happy that there are other people out there that think this way, because I’ve had a hard time finding them in my surroundings.
Yes, yes, yes. I love your writing, and I love that you are writing about this in an engaging and hopeful way. Because I don’t really have any good answers, I tend to want to push it out of my consciousness… but it inevitably elbows its way back in. I think about it CONSTANTLY (I think we might have some similarities in how we grew up) and I am also overcome with that same wonder and gratitude and unease. Bravo for starting the conversation. I look forward to more.
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