That’s the first line of Murphy, by Samuel Beckett. I chose it because I’m sure what I’m about to write will be nothing new. That’s no matter though. I’m writing because I like to write, because I’m good at it, and because it helps me to manage myself. This is not for you. This is for me.
I’m at something of a crossroads. I suppose that even though I am 32 and should have done this a long time ago, I am going through something of a quarter-life crisis. I’ve always been a late bloomer.
I did all the things I thought I was supposed to do – I got good enough grades, worked hard in college, took care of myself for a while (or so I thought), went to graduate school for something I thought I wanted to be, and then got out into the world and was miserable. I smashed my head up against the wall that was my M.Ed for six years and then finally broke down. I took a little safe job in the country, found super cheap living arrangements, and started putting myself back together.
Now it’s two years later, I own a house that it also a business that makes between a fourth and a half of what my income should be (Wimberley is a tourist town, so no guilt, the cost of living is already high because of all the fancy boomers that isolated themselves in their 1950s retirement dream homes), and I’ve left the little safe job I started with. I only have to make about $1k/month extra to pay all my bills (granted that’s because I have help with health insurance, gotta be clear), and this is where I am stuck. I’m a walking bundle of idealist contradictions
The money I make on Airbnb isn’t enough to cover my own bills, but I’m already a more willing dope in the US capitalist structure than I’d like. I’m white, well-educated, and healthy, so there’s no reason I can’t take care of myself. I’m at the bottom of the experience/hiring scale because I’m starting in new fields. Others, however, are there either because they’re not well and can’t get help, and even more others are there because people are not evenly equipped and supported from birth. Maybe they inherited too many responsibilities at once and can’t get ahead again. I myself, with all my advantages don’t know if I can support myself on Airbnb, my new job as a barista, and my *HOPEFUL* new job cleaning houses.
It makes me mad that folks can be be played by people who do less work and make more money. It’s depressing that people in worse situations than myself have no other choice. I’ve been picky about the jobs that I’ve chose because I know I’d be a terrible, spoiled, defiant Wal-Mart (etc.) employee. AT THE SAME TIME, I acknowledge that I’m extremely privileged to have the OPTION to be picky about my jobs, my life plans, and political/cultural beliefs.
I’m privileged that my life allows for me to hold utopian ideals and beliefs. I’m at an advantage with an education to understand what I’m advocating, and my early life was gentle enough that I feel like I have energy and resources to spare for others.
I don’t support violence, I don’t support disorder. I support a side-to-side system of organization instead of one from the top down. I don’t think that system can exist in current world, even if people did rise up and violently overthrow the current political/cultural/economic system, because of the extreme advantages and disadvantages stratified over the population. We wouldn’t be able to agree, discuss, and have real, side-to-side cooperation.
Because survival of the fittest and subsequent capitalism has made the situation in which some people are not equipped to cooperate, OUR GOAL AS ANARCHISTS MUST BE TO SEEK THE ENABLEMENT OF EACH INDIVIDUAL TO PARTICIPATE IN A SOCIETY THAT COOPERATES. That means food, shelter, clothing, love, education, and structure from an early age. It means enabling people so thoroughly that they feel they have the space to step down when another’s needs are greater. It means working towards a system that won’t ever be perfect (because of human nature), but chooses to aim higher than our animal nature.
Anyway, I know Edison had to use candles to light the room while he was inventing the light bulb. Bell had to write letters while inventing the telegraph. I have to work within a system I don’t fully support in order to change it. There’s no use and no progress to be made by behaving destructively (not without sullying our own goal). Anarchists, myself included, must hope to construct such a strong, well-regulated, successful community that it replaces the current one because it’s better.
That is the topic this blog aims to explore and support. Also, all of my stupid white girl interests, just because this is my journal too and I get to do whatever I want with it. Here I go!
The Anti-Capitalist Parent 