As the commercial came to an end, Rose and I looked at each other across the room, our eyes wide with incredulity.
Why do we work so hard?… for stuff? … in other countries they work, they stroll home, they stop by the café, they take August off. OFF. Why aren’t you like that? Why aren’t we like that? Because we’re crazy, driven, hard working believers, that’s why… [bla bla] … as for all “the stuff”? That’s the upside of only taking two weeks off in August.
This intense promotion of dark, greedy consumerism was lost on our hosts, who, being Americans with TVs, are bombarded by auto commercials all day every day. I, for one, sure ain’t going to go out and buy a new Cadillac off the back of this. It makes me sick to see the media pushing new stuff down peoples’ throats everywhere – stuff that they just don’t need. New phones, new gizmos and gadgets, new vitamin supplements, new cars, bigger homes … for what? To become “happier”?
We don’t own a TV. I’ve never owned a TV, and Rose hasn’t had one since we moved in together over seven years ago. Seeing this commercial reminded me why. Sure, there are lots of awesome programs on but you can get most of that on the internet now, which means you don’t have to sit in front of the goggle box, bombarded by messages telling you to do this, do that, buy this, buy that. We make our own choices.
I lost pretty much all of my meagre possessions when my camper van was broken into just after moving from Sheffield to Bristol in 2005, and since then I’ve consciously not been building up a load of stuff to hold me down like a ball and chain around my ankles. We now live on a boat that doesn’t have much room, and that’s just fine. We moved out here to the USA with just a few bags on the plane and now it’s a case of “one in, one out” when it comes to “stuff”.
When we moved out of our house, we figured we’d put a few things in storage. We were pleasantly surprised to discover that all we owned fitted into the six or so bags we were taking with us, plus half a crate in a storage warehouse for some books and paintings.
I came across this minimalist game the other day. See if you can make it through 30 days. I don’t think I’ve got enough stuff to!
Road and Ocean 