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Jul. 12th, 2009 11:55 amAPPARENTLY my body has decided I'm no longer allowed to sleep. One of my great luxuries is getting to stay up late on Friday and Saturday evenings, because I can have a lie-in the next morning, but the last two days I've woken up at six am and not been able to get back to sleep. On the one hand it's annoying; on the other, I get a ton of stuff done.
This morning I got up, did the billions of dishes in my sink, and Epic Pitas and a big tray of Improvisational Cheese Bread (gruyere and munster were my cheeses of choice this time). I was going to make rice, but I packed my lunches for the week in tupperware and realised that I won't have any need for rice that I can't reheat, so that'll be an event for either mid-week dinner or next weekend. Related to my earlier post about saving money on food and cheap delicious recipes, I realised pretty much all I eat is leftovers; I make a big batch of food on the weekend and package it up for the week, then reheat stuff for dinner most nights. I almost never cook individual meals. As one person, there's often very little point.
Ianto's post broke 1600 comments in 24 hours, which is pretty awesome and has been a lot of fun. We've also officially raised £112 for Red Nose Day, more than twice our goal, and thus not only can we buy a really spankin gourd, but also some adorable British children. Or if we go whole-hog we could buy a minialist sink!
Between raising $300+ with Nameless charitable sales and this, I've been thinking a lot about philanthropy lately and how I interact with it. When I was a kid we gave money to various causes, and I trick-or-treated for UNICEF a few years, but it wasn't really out of any kind of moral stance or philosophy. It was just what we did, what my parents raised us to do. The motivation behind the fic I used to write for charity was the same. I never felt especially accomplished or pleased to raise money, but it was What You Do; I didn't volunteer as much as I could have because it was real physical work that wouldn't satisfy either my soul or my pocketbook.
As I get older, especially now that I work in the not-for-profit sector, I get more pleasure out of it. I think perhaps part of it is that it's a scary fucking world out there, and giving money to help people live better lives is one of the few things I do that is really totally morally unambiguous. My decisions about where to live, where to buy my food and clothing, what entertainment I pay for are hard, because it seems like whatever I do it contributes to an economic system that hurts someone. Putting money into humanity becomes...easier, when I feel conflicted about eating beef or living in one of the most opulent countries in the world.
It's not an attempt to balance the scales or pay for some supposed sins; it's a pleasure in itself. I did something good, and nobody can say it isn't.
As I get closer to my thirtieth birthday in September, I'm thinking a lot about how I live my life, the systems I've developed, the patterns of thought I have. I want to be someone who is still cool and kind and happy when they're forty and fifty and sixty. There are a lot of things I need to do to make sure that I'm on that course.
Anyway. Life is a work in progress; as a friend of mine used to say, Love like you don't need the money, Dance like you've never been hurt, and Work like no one is watching.
Words to live by. :D
This morning I got up, did the billions of dishes in my sink, and Epic Pitas and a big tray of Improvisational Cheese Bread (gruyere and munster were my cheeses of choice this time). I was going to make rice, but I packed my lunches for the week in tupperware and realised that I won't have any need for rice that I can't reheat, so that'll be an event for either mid-week dinner or next weekend. Related to my earlier post about saving money on food and cheap delicious recipes, I realised pretty much all I eat is leftovers; I make a big batch of food on the weekend and package it up for the week, then reheat stuff for dinner most nights. I almost never cook individual meals. As one person, there's often very little point.
Ianto's post broke 1600 comments in 24 hours, which is pretty awesome and has been a lot of fun. We've also officially raised £112 for Red Nose Day, more than twice our goal, and thus not only can we buy a really spankin gourd, but also some adorable British children. Or if we go whole-hog we could buy a minialist sink!
Between raising $300+ with Nameless charitable sales and this, I've been thinking a lot about philanthropy lately and how I interact with it. When I was a kid we gave money to various causes, and I trick-or-treated for UNICEF a few years, but it wasn't really out of any kind of moral stance or philosophy. It was just what we did, what my parents raised us to do. The motivation behind the fic I used to write for charity was the same. I never felt especially accomplished or pleased to raise money, but it was What You Do; I didn't volunteer as much as I could have because it was real physical work that wouldn't satisfy either my soul or my pocketbook.
As I get older, especially now that I work in the not-for-profit sector, I get more pleasure out of it. I think perhaps part of it is that it's a scary fucking world out there, and giving money to help people live better lives is one of the few things I do that is really totally morally unambiguous. My decisions about where to live, where to buy my food and clothing, what entertainment I pay for are hard, because it seems like whatever I do it contributes to an economic system that hurts someone. Putting money into humanity becomes...easier, when I feel conflicted about eating beef or living in one of the most opulent countries in the world.
It's not an attempt to balance the scales or pay for some supposed sins; it's a pleasure in itself. I did something good, and nobody can say it isn't.
As I get closer to my thirtieth birthday in September, I'm thinking a lot about how I live my life, the systems I've developed, the patterns of thought I have. I want to be someone who is still cool and kind and happy when they're forty and fifty and sixty. There are a lot of things I need to do to make sure that I'm on that course.
Anyway. Life is a work in progress; as a friend of mine used to say, Love like you don't need the money, Dance like you've never been hurt, and Work like no one is watching.
Words to live by. :D
