I sometimes do a bit of planning, nothing too dictatorial. The flexibility is an essential feature of our bohemianism. Money comes in, goes out and occasionally we have some left over to do stuff.
With my seventies on the horizon, financial security would be nice and good health a more pressing concern. If the Tories dismantle the NHS, and we all have to start paying private rates for surgery, dentistry and medication – the rich will be fine….the rest of us will get sentimental about mixed economies, social welfare and the like.
Putting your cards on the table, and weighing up how good a hand you have,clarifies how well you are playing the precarious game of life. The odd joker crops up to add an element of randomness, such as Brexit, sub prime banking fiasco, and unexpected events that can scupper your plans overnight.
Money is handy, but the love of status and the trappings of power is nothing I will ever have to lose sleep over. Family is central to most people’s well-being, and I am very lucky with my direct family and in-laws. They are supportive and caring, the sort of folk you can rely on in a crisis and have a laugh with through good times and bad.
Philosophy reminds me that an examined life is a worthwhile activity. Mostly we plough through our daily routines and grasp opportunities for greater rewards or some personal gains that add to our sense of self worth. Rarely do we sit back and ponder what it all amounts to. Numbers can be applied to the material aspects of our lives, but the unquantifiable is usually much more important.
As an existentialist may well have said in a bar somewhere in the Western world, “you can’t take it with you, mate, but come up here and have a good butcher’s”.
odespinner 