Hi Neighbour,
I’ve been thinking of the idea that in the next year we may not return to the same level of spending as we had pre-pandemic. I probably won’t. But, then again, I’ve never been the kind of person to keep-up-with-the-Joneses (a cliché from the 1950’s = buying things to match your more affluent neighbours’ things). I hope we’ve moved beyond these tendencies, and learned that we don’t need ‘things’ to make us happy.
As Socrates wrote: “The secret of happiness, you see, is not found in seeking more, but in developing the capacity to enjoy less.” The idea of ‘less is more’ is not about owning less for the sake of having less (although 1-800-GOT-JUNK? might help you unclutter). It is about our capacity to enjoy less, shop less and share more. This makes me think of the ways the younger generation shares things, such as car share, bike share, Airbnb (like Homelink, that I wrote about last March) and even ‘tool share’, from the Vancouver Tool Library. I’ve long been a public library patron and all the books that I read and write about come from one of the many libraries in Metro Vancouver. I can even have a book sent to a local library from a distant library in BC, if I can’t find it locally. Such service!
In the last few months, I have discovered the MetroVan Repair Cafés. If you go to that link you’ll see: “Tinkerers Tailors Knitters Nailers, Welcome fixers of all kinds…” so you can actually volunteer and help people repair their things at home. Their next Virtual Repair Workshop will be on Saturday, June 26, 11:00 – 1:00. You can register for the Zoom link and attend as an observer, to start, or you can fill out a time slot (for a breakout room) to have help to repair something, such as a small appliance, a computer or a textile. West Van Memorial Library is having an in-person Repair Cafe on July 10, 10a.m. – 2:30p.m. But register first, to be sure there’s a slot for you and your broken item. At the beginning of June, I attended the Virtual Repair Café Burnaby, and had 2 volunteers helping me. It was so wonderful! It’s empowering to darn your favourite sweater or fix a tool instead of having to buy a new one, when you know that your tool was made when manufacturers didn’t believe in ‘planned obsolescence’ (= ‘short life’).
Are we — or were we — chasing the almighty dollar and burning the candle at both ends in order to ‘get rich’? Or did we buy a lottery ticket every week, believing that our luck could change. Some people have reassessed their job situation and decided that it’s time to make a change. Btw (by the way), did you know that on the North Shore, this year, old houses are selling faster than new houses? Your old is my new.
Fiona