This is a difficult essay to write.
I’m a rather shy person and don’t enjoy talking about my personal life in
general. There are two reasons for this: it’s embarrassing to showcase one’s
screw-ups and on those rare occasions that I get it right, it sounds like
bragging to me. So I will preface this article with a disclaimer: I wish to
neither embarrass myself, nor to brag. But I feel this topic is important
enough to warrant the inclusion of some personal details. So let’s get on with
it…
The Real and the Counterfeit
“Freedom” is an interesting word.
Those of us not living under dictators and military regimes have the luxury of
a certain type of freedom, and a valuable one. But personal autonomy carries
with it a notion of freedom which really isn’t. Let me explain.
I have the freedom to live beyond my
means, financially. Most middle class people do. I have the freedom to get
addicted to a certain standard of living or get hooked on any number of legal
vices, ranging from technology to fast food. But for those of us whose
happiness depends upon a certain standard of living, are we really free? I’d
like to argue that the answer is “no” because one wrong turn of the economy,
one layoff, or one desperately sick child or parent can put that lifestyle into
serious jeopardy. If such tragedies actually occur, then we fall into anger and
depression. If those things don’t occur, then we live in the fear that they
might. Either way, we have a tight grip on something we can’t control, like
trying to seize water with our bare hands.
Rather, I would argue, freedom is not
simply trading in one form of oppression (that of a militant state) for another
(the pressures of society). Nor is freedom living in fear that something bad
might happen and we’ll lose it all. Freedom, I would posit, is simply being
content. Now granted, that’s not a new concept (I stole it from Saint Paul
myself) but it’s one that’s rarely practiced.
My wife grew up poor. She lived a
simple, contented life in a third world country, working her way through
college and earning an accounting degree. And without that accounting degree,
we never would have even met each other. So I’m thankful for that. But after
ten years of being married to me, she found herself (along with me, of course)
completely corrupted by the American lifestyle. We had a house in the burbs,
two cars, and good credit. We also had a mountain of debt from a bad business
idea (that was mine) and countless unplanned emergencies, some of which were our
own making, and often someone else’s. And then that mountain began to crumble
and bury us underneath it. We had to earn more and more money, working longer
and longer hours to keep up. For a stretch of two years, my wife found herself
working two full time jobs, averaging 80 hours a week.
Now I want to point
out something here: neither me, nor my wife, have anything resembling
extravagant tastes by American standards. But it didn’t matter, because we
still clung to our scraps. Did we feel free? Nope. Did we feel happy? Nope.
I remember a defining moment that happened last fall. I was having lunch in the car with my wife on our lunch break during a particularly stressful day for us both. It was one of those days when you can’t even articulate your frustration, you can only groan. I remember turning to Melanie and saying, “Can we just be poor?” I saw a sudden glimmer of hope in her eyes and she said, “Really! Do you really mean it!” Her excited response made me laugh. She acted like I’d just offered her a cruise to the Bahamas.
Of course, I was being a bit tongue-in-cheek. I wasn’t really talking about being poor per se, but the hope of a more simple life. And she knew what I meant. A little backstory here… Melanie and I have been trying to adopt a little boy (her nephew). U.S. adoption law states that unless the foreign child is an orphan, there’s a requirement that the adopting parents must live with the child for two years prior to filing paperwork. I contacted my two state senators to get clarification about this strange rule, but never heard back. Your tax dollars at work, folks!
So we made the radical decision to sell everything we own and leave behind the comfortable and the familiar… for a simple life, and for a kid named Andrew. We have our tickets. We’re leaving in a month.
Now having said all this, there is the possibility that none of it will work out. It’s possible that everything could go terribly wrong while living overseas with a meager, uncertain income and a jumbled adoption process. But I’ll confess something (and Melanie feels the same way)… we’re not the least bit afraid. At all. And it’s not because I’m terribly brave because that’s certainly not the case! We’re not afraid because we’re not clinging to anything. There’s nothing to lose because nothing is certain in life anyway, and knowing that is helpful. And knowing that allows us to be content.
There was a time when we were
self-sufficient, and there was a measure of pride in that. Never having to ask
for help puffed us up. It made us feel important, and even better than others.
Now we will have to humble ourselves and ask for help at times. Probably often.
And that’s not a bad thing. It’s actually good for the soul, and dispels the
illusion that we don’t need other people. The truth is, we do need them, and
they need us. That’s how it works. We Americans are good at so many things, but
we’re really bad at this. Community is a word we don’t recognize. When Melanie
and I return to the U.S. (whether that’s in 6 months or 6 years) we will be
bringing the island back with us. I remember a defining moment that happened last fall. I was having lunch in the car with my wife on our lunch break during a particularly stressful day for us both. It was one of those days when you can’t even articulate your frustration, you can only groan. I remember turning to Melanie and saying, “Can we just be poor?” I saw a sudden glimmer of hope in her eyes and she said, “Really! Do you really mean it!” Her excited response made me laugh. She acted like I’d just offered her a cruise to the Bahamas.
Of course, I was being a bit tongue-in-cheek. I wasn’t really talking about being poor per se, but the hope of a more simple life. And she knew what I meant. A little backstory here… Melanie and I have been trying to adopt a little boy (her nephew). U.S. adoption law states that unless the foreign child is an orphan, there’s a requirement that the adopting parents must live with the child for two years prior to filing paperwork. I contacted my two state senators to get clarification about this strange rule, but never heard back. Your tax dollars at work, folks!
So we made the radical decision to sell everything we own and leave behind the comfortable and the familiar… for a simple life, and for a kid named Andrew. We have our tickets. We’re leaving in a month.
Now having said all this, there is the possibility that none of it will work out. It’s possible that everything could go terribly wrong while living overseas with a meager, uncertain income and a jumbled adoption process. But I’ll confess something (and Melanie feels the same way)… we’re not the least bit afraid. At all. And it’s not because I’m terribly brave because that’s certainly not the case! We’re not afraid because we’re not clinging to anything. There’s nothing to lose because nothing is certain in life anyway, and knowing that is helpful. And knowing that allows us to be content.
