I wanted to comment more on Lyda's post. First of all, no one who is responsible for raising a small child can be a full-time writer. Kids are serious work. I know that women have worked and raised children throughout human history. I don't know how they did it. Maybe by using older children. "Mind your brother, while I cook dinner for 20 harvest hands." Maybe they didn't do a lot that required sustained concentration. A lot of house work can be done in fits and starts. The kids were set to work as soon as possible in many cultures. That must have helped. "Go out and gather eggs from the hens, Little Timmy, while I finish making clothing for the entire family."
I remember my mother's story about my great grandmother or possibly it was my great-great grandmother. Her husband died young, leaving her with four children and the family farm. She worked the farm and raised the kids, and the only time she saw another adult was when a neighbor woman came over in the evening and they sewed together by lantern light.
So when I envy writers like Lyda and Kim Stanley Robinson, who get to stay home and raise the kids and write, maybe I am not thinking the situation through.
Secondly, in this culture there is usually a trade off between money and time. You can have one or the other. Most people can't have both. Many people get by without much of either. I have money at the moment, because I am working full time. One of the things I did last weekend was spend too much money -- getting a haircut and two pairs of New Balance shoes and a Marimekko bag I didn't really need. I have often wondered if spending money is a way to compensate for lack of free time. You are missing something -- freedom, a life of your own spent the way you want to spend it -- and you buy in an effort to fill the emptiness, the sense of loss.
I guess I am saying that most of us can't win for losing. Either we have a life of our own and we are poor; or we have money and not a lot of time for our own lives.
I started working full time (or close to full time) ten years ago, when I realized I couldn't afford to retire. Now, ten years later, I am reaching the age when retirement is visible on the horizon; and I am almost ready to take less money is exchange for more time. My dream situation would be to collect Social Security while continuing to work part time. We will see.
I hope this post isn't too gloomy. Many people do manage to write while working or raising children. My point is not that it's impossible. I'm saying it's not easy.
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4 comments:
Eleanor, you struck achingly true for my experience on a particular chord there, that being that perhaps we spend to reach out for the sense of freedom that we don't otherwise feel. I only want to flesh that out a bit by saying that I don't think it is the actual spending, but the release of tension that comes with letting go, with allowing yourself not to be on a schedule, on a budget, on a tight wire--for just a little while. I think spending is a symptom of that need for freedom, and that the same release can be found in other avenues--anything where control is allowed to take a hiatus for time. Spending is just one of the more socially acceptable ways of "losing control", because it tends to buttress the existent society, whereas drinking, fighting, driving fast, having affairs, etc., tend to allow for the same dissociation from control, but also are seen as tossing a clog in the gears of society at large.
I agree that the allure of spending, of freedom, is a strong one, and that we all need space away from the path we regularly tread. I have a feeling that few people are living exactly the lives they would want to be living.
I agree with Sean about spending money as a tension release.
I'm working full time, have a kid, and am writing (almost) every night. It doesn't leave time for other little things, like having a life. Now I'm fortunate that my wife (who also works full time) and I are both very good organizers (her better than me). We schedule and budget out our time fairly well so that we each have the opportunity to go out once a week if we want, and we try to arrange babysitting once a month so we can go out together.
The nice thing is that I'm saving money right now, for lack of time to spend it. The difficult thing is we're about to buy a house, so money and time are each going to get tighter.
Speaking of time, I'm at work. Back to it.
We have definitely traded time for money. Yet somehow, I feel like I still don't have much of either. (I suppose that would be true no matter what our income, though.)
The release of tension makes sense to me, too. One of the best presents I got from my parents this holiday season was fifty dollars on my coffee card at my favorite coffee shop. The little luxury of the latte does, in point of fact, briefly feel indulgent and "free."
Very wise, Eleanor.
Tate -- I will stand you a latte anytime you feel the need.
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