Being Alive

Ah, the deliciousness of a night in. Outside, the rain is pounding mercilessly against my window panes.... but I will not be reminded of the brutality outside. Here, all is warm and bright, and I am drinking Hungarian Tokay out of a hand blown glass that looks as though it might be seen at a party given by the Princesse de Lamballe for Marie Antoinette.

You know of course that the Princesse de Lamballe and Marie Antoinette used to dress up in the sheerest muslin and retreat to their hamlet where they would pretend to be milkmaids. In the midst of the baroque splendour that is Versailles, they chose to be rustic and earthy. It was not unlike the citizen of Vancouver who in the midst of privilege decides to wear homespun cloth and eat organic food in order to distance himself from the exploitative nature of his very existence... it is no good to take little where there is plenty. If a rich man eats only coarse bread, he will expect the poor to eat stones.

I do not expect anyone else to change anything about themselves.. that is folly. I, flawed and imperfect and miraculous can and will change. And to do so I will make choices. Of course, choices are easy for me - choice is the prerogative of the privileged. I do not expect those who are less privileged than I am to hate me any less because I choose to live in a way that I think less materialistic -- less exploitative.

For when you come down to it, I am where I am because of an accident of birth.
And I do not dare to think that I deserve to be anywhere else. I wholeheartedly accept my life as it is. In fact, I embrace it. I cannot say I have always done that.

I am drinking Tokay out of a hand-blown glass. And I know that there are millions of people who don't even have clean water. I don't know what to say.