(Fuck-You) Money and a Room (in a Dwelling) of One's Own
A thousand pens are ready to suggest what you should do and what effect you will have. My own suggestion is a little fantastic, I admit; I prefer, therefore, to put it in the form of...
A blog post.
As I've begun to slowly dismantle and clear away lifetime of obfuscating smoke and mirrors that I and others have set up in my little internal world, it leaves me thinking about what I really want as opposed to what I've sometimes assumed I want all these years. What do I want my life to look like, really?
The hard part is realizing that most of the more traditional models of lifestyle that seem to work for others just don't seem to look good on me. Things that most strive for and find meaning in--the successful career, the marriage, the kids, comfortable domesticity, the ownership of fine things...these all end up leaving me feeling cold. Sometimes even ill. I have tried to make these things fit me, because (I think) I have assumed that if I didn't apply these more common models, there would be very few people who I could connect with. People UNDERSTAND when you want a traditional marriage or love relationship. That makes THEM comfortable, and so they tend to be comfortable with you and treat you well. When you opt for something other, well, that makes people uncomfortable. They don't understand and often with lack of understanding or ability to relate comes fear. And with fear comes anger and often cruelty or alienation.
I have been learning, and getting on well with doing so, how to stop caring what others think, and just live in my own state of being and desire. To start tuning out what works for others so I can focus on what really works for me. The thing is, as I said, nothing I've ever seen so far seems to work for me. I feel I need something different than the standard. And yet, sheer creative invention of my perfect world from naught--from pure imagination--is a hard thing. Mostly, I think, because of old lingering fears.
Mostly fears of support. I need time and space to be able to design what right looks like to me. But the things I don't want: an office job, a family, a capital-H kind of Husband who I'm a capital-W Wife to, staying always in one town in one place...I find myself yearning for the freedom from these things. I find myself wanting to END RIGHT NOW all these things to whatever extent I have them now, or any inroads I've laid towards them. I just want to walk away, into the new thing. I feel so desperate for this, I feel sometimes like I'm clawing at air, trying to get out of some physical confinement and into some new space where I can breathe. But how will I be able to support for/care for myself if I give up these common dreams? These are the dreams of security, of safety. This path is how you gain safety, we've always been told. This is the way, the only way, to ensure you don't end up alone and eating cat food in your 80s.
On a radio show I listen to, they often use the phrase "fuck-you money;" a concept which I love. By it, they mean having enough money to know you could walk away from anything if you felt like it, and you would be okay. If your boss was giving you a hard time, if your job was getting miserable, you could just say fuck you and be off on your way, no harm no foul. Because you know that regardless, you'll be okay...you can afford it. What a sense of freedom and power, to have that! How intensely I desire that. Knowing that no one can make you do something out of fear of poverty or financial insecurity. Sacrifices, if made, are made entirely out of free will and not practicality. This is what I want. I want fuck-you money. I want the freedom to be able to create anything I want, to work at whatever I want, with no financial concern roping me in to choices that make me miserable or even semi-miserable. I've had jobs that are bearable. I just don't want anything to be bearable anymore.
So if I'm going to imagine what right looks like for me right now, what happy looks like, well then right now I can see two very clear things--I want serious fuck-you money. And I want a dwelling. At least one. Preferably more than one, in locales that inspire me.
Right now, happy looks like living on my own, in a place that feels luxuriously mine, with lovers and interesting, creative friends always near at hand. By luxurious I don't necessarily mean extravagant. I mean lush. I want a salon. I want a library. I want books and conversation and lounging and laughing and dancing and music and dinners and just general, continual exchange and life. I want special people, and I want my solitude. I want to be like Jeanne Moreau or Mae West; I want to grow old and independent and strong and loved (romantically and otherwise) by a variety of people who touch me, physically and intellectually and spiritually. A happy choice. A joyful one. Not made for lack of other choices. Made because it is my choice, freely chosen, and it fits me beautifully. I look stunning in it.
From there, I can go after many other things. But these two things, if I can have them right now, it will make everything else open up. So this small tweak of old Virginia's mantra: I need fuck-you money and a room in a dwelling of my own.
...my belief is that this poet who never wrote a word and was buried at the cross–roads still lives...she lives; for great poets do not die; they are continuing presences; they need only the opportunity to walk among us in the flesh...if we face the fact, for it is a fact, that there is no arm to cling to, but that we go alone and that our relation is to the world of reality and not only to the world of men and women, then the opportunity will come and the dead poet who was Shakespeare’s sister will put on the body which she has so often laid down.
Comments (6)
Dearest Syl - Have you been raiding my mind again? Gosh, I have these same thoughts all the time, to be free from constraint I believe would be liberating. And yet, I constantly run up against the wall of responsibility and commitment, and while I do not feel trapped by them per se, they do indeed exert a certain level of trappyness to which I am confined. Argh. It can be frustrating. On the other hand, I have often heard it said by those smarter than myself, that a positive image, held firmly in mind and dream, of what we want to be, held tight and close and believed in, might allow us to eventually achieve such a goal. In my own life I have seen this power first hand. And while my own journey continues, I can clearly see progress along the roadway, milestones and landmarks by which I understand that indeed I am making progress. The old falls away each and every day, to be replaced with new and exciting opportunities, both planned for and unexpected.
It's late and I am talking (writing) in run-on sentences, but I hope my meaning is coming through. Believe in your dream, a true dream that one day will become a dream come true. It can be.
The things that we see as society placing restrictions ON us, is simply restrictions that WE have allowed to be placed on us, that we have accepted. We do not have to accept them, we have choice. With choice comes responsibility however, and a decision about how much we are willing to accept and how much we are willing to give up, but to each of us is given the chance to make those choices, in both large and small degrees, in moments large and small. What path will we take? What choices will we make?
Find a life that suits you and live that life to the fullest.
Ha! I had no intention for this comment to turn into a self-help book, but your post touched me and hit close to home, so pardon the language and hopefully the intent is clear. As always, your tallest fan. Kisses.
1. Posted by ArtfulDodger on February 7, 2007
Mostly fears of support. I need time and space to be able to design what right looks like to me. But the things I don't want: an office job, a family, a capital-H kind of Husband who I'm a capital-W Wife to, staying always in one town in one place...I find myself yearning for the freedom from these things. I find myself wanting to END RIGHT NOW all these things to whatever extent I have them now, or any inroads I've laid towards them. I just want to walk away, into the new thing. I feel so desperate for this, I feel sometimes like I'm clawing at air, trying to get out of some physical confinement and into some new space where I can breathe. But how will I be able to support for/care for myself if I give up these common dreams? These are the dreams of security, of safety. This path is how you gain safety, we've always been told. This is the way, the only way, to ensure you don't end up alone and eating cat food in your 80s.
Recently found your blog, enjoying it a great deal. The paragraph above described the feeling in my head to a T. I found myself nodding in agreement as I read it. wow...
2. Posted by Drama on February 8, 2007
Dear Syl,
I think your "happy" sounds pretty good to me. You have obvilously given much thought to your life and what you want out of it.
I'm about half way there myself now. While I may not have the fuck you money, I am close due to the life insurance my wife left when she died. I own my house and have no bills other than ulitities now. I could walk away from my job, but I would have to find another one within a few months to pay property taxes and the such. But it has given me the freedom to do some things I've wanted to for a while without having to worry about the cost. Yet I still think about my choices in life in the same old way that you mentioned. I am trying to re-evaluate my them now, but a lifetime of "conditioning" is hard to break, and the hardest one for me is "I have to find another women to marry". I've reached the conclusion that I really don't want that for now, but I have to keep reinforcing it to myself.
Good luck on your search for the FU money and a home.
3. Posted by Fusion on February 8, 2007
Hi, I've been a long time reader of your blog and you seem very smart and insightful. I am terribly embarrassed :: covers face in humiliation:: to even request that you blog about something but I am thinking about losing my virginity and I was wonder if either you could do a little something about your opinions or whatever or please offer any advice. I'm kinda nervous but mostly just need some reassurance. Could you help me out? :) Please?
4. Posted by Anonymous on February 8, 2007
You know when it gets down to the marrow, its about the journey not the destination(oh how long it took me to get that) we are always works in progress and always heading toward who we truly are, that is magic. I think we are born knowing everything, and we forget so we can experience living.
as Willy Wordsworth was wont to say:
Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting:
The Soul that rises with us, our life's Star,
Hath had elsewhere its setting,
And cometh from afar:
Not in entire forgetfulness,
And not in utter nakedness,
But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God, who is our home:
It's about creativity, passion, joy, pleasure, pain, rage, ecstasy. its about your work of being yourself in this world, and thank the Gods its beautiful. forget what mother culture feeds us, life is not the emptiness that people try to stuff full with the sawdust of what we are supposed to need.
I want to be a party on a houseboat. my current favorite mantra is I am infinite and I will not apologize for who I am.
You carry divinity, the body is home to the spirit and blessed are you among women to live, love and work in such temple. you are already home.
hail and be welcome.
5. Posted by dangerbunny on February 15, 2007
I am going thru the exact same thing. It's as if you have penetrated my mind and rummaged thru my thoughts.
I am at the crossroads, deciding on my future. Should I welcome society's stability? Become a good wife/mother or should I continue down the road without an arm to hold onto?
All of this has been causing my brain to ache, but now I know the path I must take. My dream will not be squandered and left to die like everything else. I will pursue with furvor.
Thank you Miss Syl so very much.
6. Posted by Natosha on March 13, 2007