Does Work Define Me?

Well, I am out of work. . . . for a week anyway. Emica asked me yesterday what motivated me and I couldn't come up with a quick answer. My first response was , "Well, I just put one foot in front of the other." Work motivates me, I guess. One of the things that I like about work, but hate at the same time, is how it defines and organizes my day. I get up when I get up so that I can be at work at a certain time. My in-box, Outlook calendar, and boss's current preoccupation defines the hour by hour of my day. Then I come home and make dinner (lately) if Dawn isn't home, or wait for it if she is. The evening unravels until bedtime and I start all over again. One of the reasons I always feel a little uneasy when my vacation starts is that dis-juncture from my regular schedule. What am I going to do, now? Not that I don't have many things to do around the house, or distractions like movies or games, but I don't have any structure or organization or guiding principle, like I do when I am at work.

So the question is , does work therefore define who I am? Really. I don't really have any hobbies or things that I am passionate about like the Red Sox or a boat. My life is mostly defined by my work. OK good or bad, it is what it is. The nagging doubt I have now is not that work is bad, per se. It is, by letting work define who I am am I running toward myself or running away? I don't agree with those people who say work is evil and inauthentic. Be damned! When I look at my achievements a significant number (but not all, girls) are what I have achieved at work. The question is, if it were all taken away - my work, that is - what would be left of me? By allowing work to define the content of my life, am I avoiding the hard work of defining myself? Who am I? What does motivate me? What are my values? I think this is an area I need to explore.

Recently, we visited a financial advisor for the first time (not counting advice from parents, thank you very much.) We discovered that we were actually in pretty good shape for retirement, all things considered. Sure, there could be some catastrophes lurking just around the corner or windfalls that we don't know about. But all in all, we are in pretty good shape. That is due mostly to Dawn's fiscal prudence. And I think it is also due to values we honed from years of relative poverty. My co-workers are silent about my bringing my lunch with me every day, but they are incredulous when I bring something I bought at Marden's or Ocean State Job Lot, or amused that when I travel I will often pass up the client-paid dinner in a restaurant for a visit to the grocery store salad bar. I can't imagine we would every buy clothes at retail or electronics that weren't from a discount outlet. And , mostly, what we eat is meat that has been marked down or bread that is near expiration. It is just the way we are and how we have raised our children. We buy all our groceries and gas on credit cards - for the points. We have no debt, other than our mortgage. Sorry, let climb off my high horse.

The point is, that visit has got me thinking about what retirement would be like. I have some time, but I need to start thinking about my priorities . . start visualizing what a world without work might be like. Well at least until 12/21/2012 of course, after that . . . anybody's guess.

I chose this poem by searching the Internet I will admit, but I have read and own some Gary Snyder poetry. I know him from his interest in Eastern religions and I remember a moving poem in which he gives his son a bath, I think. Anyway, I immediately related to this poem since I can remember the same thought in the hayloft when I was a kid.

Hay for the Horses
by Gary Snyder

He had driven half the night
From far down San Joaquin
Through Mariposa, up the
Dangerous Mountain roads,
And pulled in at eight a.m.
With his big truckload of hay
behind the barn.
With winch and ropes and hooks
We stacked the bales up clean
To splintery redwood rafters
High in the dark, flecks of alfalfa
Whirling through shingle-cracks of light,
Itch of haydust in the
sweaty shirt and shoes.
At lunchtime under Black oak
Out in the hot corral,
---The old mare nosing lunchpails,
Grasshoppers crackling in the weeds---
"I'm sixty-eight" he said,
"I first bucked hay when I was seventeen.
I thought, that day I started,
I sure would hate to do this all my life.
And dammit, that's just what
I've gone and done."

When Your Body Fails You.

So, I injured my back this week doing the stupidest of things, reaching for a spoon I had dropped behind my desk. Pretty soon I couldn't stand or move without a nagging pull in my lower back. So I started on the Ibuprofen and graduated to Aleve and now I am wearing this stick-on heating pad that is only slightly less embarrassing than a Depend.

For all the pleasures I have given this body, I should have know it would betray me in the end; they always do. My secret pleasure at being the most healthy in the family is gone ("Hell, I never get sick."). Pride Goeth Before the Fall (or reach as the case may be). This morning, however, my anger at my body for betraying me turned to fear. Like the metaphor of the frog in the pot, you don't realize the water is getting slowly warmer and warmer until you are frog soup. That is, until some little thing like back pain reminds you that every day is a struggle against death. Pretty soon all sorts of bits and pieces will fail until finally the parts that don't work will outnumber the parts that do.

That is not a bad thing to realize, in fact I think it is a good thing. "Clay lies still, but bloods a rover." I ain't dead yet, but I am dying a little every day. We all are, it is just a matter of time. So get up and do what needs to be done, I tell myself. Drink the good wine, not the cheap stuff; Stop and smell the damned flowers once in a while; Keep hitting up the goddess you live with for a little 'afternoon delight' while you can. Here's a poem I wrote:

Next

When I look up the line

there aren't a lot left in front;

GG's gone and Nana too,

And the grandfather whose body I have.

When I look up the line,

I see some faltering

In body and in mind;

Rooms locked and left,

Never to be returned to;

Empty except for a broken

Chair in the corner.

Rooms whose key is lost

And contents are forgotten.

I can look down the line

And be cheered by what I see;

Brilliance and love;

Can imagine babies yet unborn.

But the line is moving, of course

and soon we will be next.