There's no inherent rush to drive into town to pay the outstanding
balance on the prior tenants' electric bill. According to the customer
representative's disembodied voice in my phone, I'm not even legally
obligated to do so. I just want the all-caps texts from my landlord to
cease. And that is worth $76.68 to accomplish.
But first, an essay.
I'm
sitting by my woodstove. I was cold, and tended to the fire to supply
more heat. I was hungry, and I ate food. Simple cravings, simple
activities, simple satiation. I stretched this morning for the same
purpose. Before that I tended to the goats and dogs and was rewarded
with a quart of milk - a meager amount as Lani and Fiona dry up for the
winter. Less milk, more baby-growing. The goat hide from this week's
butcher (thank you for your life, The Gimp) sits tanning in a saline
solution by the stove. I stir it occasionally. Last night's dinner was
his brother. This summer they ate weeds and fed the earth. Now that
winter has fallen, they feed me.
Yet now I'm in a web, getting
harsh texts from the landlord, making multiple calls to the faceless
electric association, tracking down information from my roommate who is
driving somewhere through the abyss of the continent. I don't know what
to feel. I'm a monkey, god dammit! What the fuck even is an "electric
association"??? In moments I feel the thrill of uncovering a mystery,
piecing together who owes what to whom. In other moments I'm anxious,
about driving into town, worried the roommates will care about paying a
bill that is only partially ours, figuring out a succinct way to
communicate to the landlord that both "I got this" and "These notices
have nothing to do with me being irresponsible." In other moments I'm
self-congratulatory, that I can competently navigate this labyrinth of
financial industrial artifice while my whole being dilates with
psilocybin.
I've been watching a lot of Alone the past couple
weeks. Season 9, now rewatching 6. (I've watched 7 at least three times
now but shoutout to 7.) I feel miles away from being able to accomplish
what some of the contestants do. But I am inching closer. Rewatching
Jordan carve up a moose, I feel a familiarity with the process. Woniya
skinning her rabbit and working the fur into a long thread - this
doesn't feel like an alien possibility for me, like it might've when I
first watched this in 2020, bundled up in my van somewhere along the
Oregon coast. I met Woniya at Wintercount last year. I'm tanning a goat
hide as we speak.
And yet in some ways I find myself moving back
towards the matrix. I just moved into a house with a couple roommates.
Yes the woodstove provides heat, but my refrigerator provided breakfast.
I've been loving watching Alone. Putting twinkly lights around the
house to make it cozy. When the mushrooms hit I reached out to friends
with my phone to feel the comfort of companionship. So many things are
at arms' length, at the push of a button. But what if they weren't? Like
the simple mechanical satiation of tending my woodstove for heat - if I
had no phone, would I walk to my neighbors' to strike up a conversation
with them? I found a few envelope-shaped pretenses for going over there
when I was digging through a pile of mail for an electric bill this
morning. I just edited a podcast where the guest was talking about the
importance of building those communities. But with only so much social
effort to give each day, I'd rather focus on the people I already know.
Again,
the possibilities paralyze me. One thing I've learned about myself in
the past few years is that for all my competence, I am still quick to
feel overwhelmed.
Back to stoking a fire to get heat. The
simplicity calms my mind, like I discovered camping did back in the
hey-day of the blog. You and your friends do the activity that meets
your need - there's nothing else to worry about. In the van trips,
things got even simpler. The electricity for my lights, fan, fridge, and
devices came from the solar panels I'd put on my roof. My water came
from the couple of tanks I filled myself every so often.
The
title of this post felt fun to write. And I am looking out the window at
my van and thinking how possible it is for me to let out a big "Fuck
This" and go back to living minimally on the road. But even then, my
food and gas always came from the Matrix. A lot of joy comes from the
Matrix. And occasionally the access to healthcare. Why tolerate this
anxiety-producing, nature-obliterating system? Lewis Mumford called it
"The Magnificent Bribe," and now that that's lodged in my mind I can't
think of a better name for it.
Personally I'm looking for the
healthiest way to engage with the Matrix. I am carving out more and more
of my food supply from outside of it. I try to spend time immersed in
unspoiled wilderness everyday. The people who are super plugged-in pay
me to take my goat herd to eat their plant matter away. In a way I feel
like I am trying to outfox a fox. Foxes are clever, but as a human I
should be able to out-clever anything else. That includes a
world-spanning monolith of vampiric techno-scaffolding. It's a worthy
challenge.
I have a million thoughts flowing off of these, but
now I must pay my tribute to this overlord. As long as I use twinkly
lights and a refrigerator, I can't be too upset about driving to town to
face the Mt. Doom of the electric offices.
Viva La Blog ✊
