![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Another Sun Lap Completed
Jan. 20th, 2024 12:17 amIt seems, as an accident of history and astronomy, that I have completed another orbit around the sun. This recurrence, rather like the arbitrary date of the new year or the solstice in preference, brings the opportunity for a bit of self-reflection of where one has come from, where one is, and where one is going. The distal vector from the Invercargill Maternity Hospital to this relatively modern Melbourne apartment does not seem as great as years of the temporal vector, with its curious and unorthodox life journey. There is a quiet internal satisfaction with what I have been fortunate enough to achieve: Seven degrees adorn the walls (and an eighth coming soon). There are a few books and articles that have my name attached to them. My employment is gainful, relevant, and interesting, as are my projects and hobbies. My health is good, my finances excellent, and I have wonderful friends who not only put up with me, sometimes I even have the conceit that they might even like me!
To give a word to describe all of this, I have "enough", like Kurt Vonnegut's poem in memory to Joe Heller. There is nothing in income or wealth that can entice me to act contrary to my character. Of course, this does not mean that I will rest upon my scant laurels, or even consider retirement in the activist sense. For far too long I have been aware, often painfully aware and with dismal precision, of the quantity of people in this world to whom even the basics required for living are absent. My good fortune in life is an accident of geography and history, as is theirs, and their life is at least as valuable as mine. It is not as if I do not indulge in bouts of hedonism or the pleasantries of Epicurean escapism, and nor do I suggest that anyone should not do so. But what I do suggest is that the happiness enjoyed by such activities is limited. For a life that is worth living always have a focus on what is the most effective choices you can make for all life. We are all bearers of the ring of Gyges; thirty years ago I read a book by Jacques Derrida; "The Other Heading". It contained a quote from Paul Valéry (" Notes sur la grandeur et decadence de l'Europe) which was the central theme and resonates as loudly now as it did when I first read it: "What are you going to do TODAY?"
To give a word to describe all of this, I have "enough", like Kurt Vonnegut's poem in memory to Joe Heller. There is nothing in income or wealth that can entice me to act contrary to my character. Of course, this does not mean that I will rest upon my scant laurels, or even consider retirement in the activist sense. For far too long I have been aware, often painfully aware and with dismal precision, of the quantity of people in this world to whom even the basics required for living are absent. My good fortune in life is an accident of geography and history, as is theirs, and their life is at least as valuable as mine. It is not as if I do not indulge in bouts of hedonism or the pleasantries of Epicurean escapism, and nor do I suggest that anyone should not do so. But what I do suggest is that the happiness enjoyed by such activities is limited. For a life that is worth living always have a focus on what is the most effective choices you can make for all life. We are all bearers of the ring of Gyges; thirty years ago I read a book by Jacques Derrida; "The Other Heading". It contained a quote from Paul Valéry (" Notes sur la grandeur et decadence de l'Europe) which was the central theme and resonates as loudly now as it did when I first read it: "What are you going to do TODAY?"