Typepad is, once again, in full-on "wonky" mode. It is very annoying.
I read this post at Lauren’s and the post here that inspired it. The question revolves around whether "fun" is largely subject to class and patriarchal culture — read Lauren’s post to understand a particularly powerful "yes" response.
It would be absurd to say that the blogosphere is a classless environment. On the one hand, it’s hard to tell from reading a particular blog what the owner’s financial circumstances are. The look and design of a blog may reveal more about the creative skills and technical expertise of the individual blogger than of his or her finances. But when the subject turns, as it did at Lauren and Twisty’s, to "fun" and "recreation", then yes, class issues become evident.
Reading Lauren’s post, I was reminded of something my mother always said — and still says — to me:
"I don’t know if time is money, but I do know that money is time."
What mama means by that is this: the goal of time may not be to make money, but perhaps the greatest gift of having money is time. Time to think, time to take leisurely walks, time to train for marathons, time to exercise, time to read novels, time to travel, time to write books and create chinchilla charities and volunteer. When I was in college, I was expected to work during my summer vacations (and I had many jobs, including working a 2:00AM-10:00AM shift for the Carmel Dept. of Public Works). But during the school year, I wasn’t expected to have a job. Some of the free time that gave me I wasted; some of it I spent taking long walks and reading, reading, reading. I had time to reflect, time to absorb, time to simply "be." It was a magnificent gift my family was able to give me. Money and class were reflected not in my clothes or my wrist watch but in the hours I was able to spend in coffee shops or lying under trees. Money made time, and my life would not have been the same otherwise.
Now that I am older, I feel an obligation to be a "good steward" of both time and money. While volunteering is not a luxury of the prosperous, the more resources one has, the more time one can give to one’s community. For example, my wife and I have housecleaners handle many tasks around the home; among the things we do with the "time saved" is volunteer with elementary age children in South L.A. two days a week (that’s her gig) and work with a high school youth group (my primary volunteer responsibility.) And then there’s the chinchilla charity and other less regular volunteer opportunities.
The old "to whom much is given, of whom much is expected" adage is loaded with class implications. It is easy to make fun of the traditionally female "professional volunteers" of an earlier era. Groups like the Junior League and others raised money for hospitals and for the homeless, visited the sick, tutored in under-performing schools. Yes, they sometimes did so in pearls and sweater sets. Yes, they often went lunching or shopping when they weren’t volunteering. But for the most part, they used their time and money to make the world a fundamentally better place — and in cities and towns all across this country, the benefits of their "community spirit" survive. Many of the older women I knew growing up lived this life: not "earning" a living, but running the non-profit boards, manning the soup lines, organizing the benefits. They used the time that their money gave them, and they used it wisely.
Until the revolution comes, and while Jesus continues to tarry, those who have had the good fortune to benefit from the system have a moral obligation to share. Tithing to charity is part of sharing (and going above the 10% tithe has been a successfully met goal for us in ‘06); tithing "time and talent" is also, I am convinced, an ethical responsibility.
And working to create a society where more people have the luxury of time to create and invent and rest is absolutely vital.
Maybe it’s because I’m from the South, but I remember the Junior League being a festering sore of snobbery and condescention. I recall, they didn’t want my friend’s mom to join because she had a “colorful” past (She had been a former Vegas Showgirl).
I have no doubt that individual Junior Leagues could be just like that, Catty. But the charity work they did — even when veiled with condescension, noblesse oblige and petty snobbery — made the world a fundamentally better place. And believe me, they were also famous for their cookbooks.
“to whom much is given, of whom much is expected”
Certainly, and people who are born into money (the “well-born”) grow up watching their elders give back to the community, and not just the community outside the house, but their domestic employees as well. I was reading an article about how americans are hiring more house help than before, but because they don’t like to think of themselves as upper-class, they rationalize their relationship with their employees as purely commercial and not a class struggle in which they have the upper hand. The thing is, people who have servant-culture (to call it something) know that you always pay the help more than they ask for, you always tip them for special services (say, they had to clean up vomit), you give them Christmas bonuses, “lend” them money whenever they’re in a snag, take their kids to your pediatrician, pay for it, buy any expensive things their children may need (i.e., if their very gifted child got to college, buy them the books) you do not penalize them for breaking dishes, you assure them they can eat whatever they want and make sure they do so when you have something fancy, you give them a uniform (if they are live-in or full-time), you get their legal wrinkles straightened out, get their relatives jobs, always pay them on time and in cash, and never terminate their employment without getting them another job (unless they did something that would merit this). If you have someone who just comes and cleans once a week, pay them even when you don’t need them (say, you’re taking a weekly vacation).
This is not set in stone, of course you only do what you can, but the intention should be there. The problem with this is that we aren’t comfortable discussing class, or calling ourselves “upper-class”. We love to call ourselves “middle class”, we make excuses for our priviledges, but we are quickly becoming the upper class of the world, and maybe we should own it.