Want

Sometimes observation happens in the most unusual circumstances. I am not a litterati... more like illiterati. Though raised by a wordsmith, I do not consider myself one any more than Romulus and Remus are wolves. But every once in a while I'll bump into a word that I thought I knew and stupify on how I missed the rest of the meaning. Lately this is happening more and more. It probably looks like a petit mal seizure, or maybe an old computer getting jammed with a huge file to process. And I would expect this sort of thing if I was one of the many English as a Second Language people. There, that second language might just help color in the understanding of your own. That's not me. If anything, I might be illiterate in a couple languages, but not enough to dare conversation in unless pressed by dire circumstance... anyway I digress.

So in this place I call home there are all these houses that are tucked away from the madness of the urban center. The houses all look alike, are well appointed, and are generally full of people who want more stuff to put in them. I'm not saying they're bad people. They are people, and people are people; products of their choices. It is apparent from the upgraded flooring, landscaping, electronics, and cars that they want more. Somehow in the story of the American this came to be the story everyone wanted... the immigrant who comes off the boat with nothing and achieves success and comfort.

That story is so much more interesting when you look at the struggle, the rise, the learning that comes for the road. Its the destination that's a let down once you've finished the trip. Somehow I think about my ancestors and their immigrant roots and can't imagine their success defined by underground sprinkling and a three car garage. They had so little and came to find their decendents with so much.

But I am still restless. I don't want any more. I am sorry I ever did. Feel stupid for ever buying a new car when a used one would have been fine, or for buying DVD movies I still haven't watched, or for making people who know and love me feel like they need to buy me something to prove it. I have more than enough. Too much. This stuff is collecting like cholesterol in my veins. I don't want it. But I did.

And that's when I started thinking about want. All these years its been 'I want a '. I remember when all I ever wanted was a 10 speed bike. Then I got it and all I ever wanted was a stereo-cassette player- the kind with TWO tape decks... and those funny lights that blinked when music played. It seems so funny now, because they are so utterly useless to me now, like in the movie The Jerk:

Navin R. Johnson: And that's it and that's the only thing I need, is this. I don't need this or this. Just this ashtray. And this paddle game, the ashtray and the paddle game and that's all I need. And this remote control. The ashtray, the paddle game, and the remote control, and that's all I need. And these matches. The ashtray, and these matches, and the remote control and the paddle ball. And this lamp. The ashtray, this paddle game and the remote control and the lamp and that's all I need. And that's all I need too. I don't need one other thing, not one - I need this. The paddle game, and the chair, and the remote control, and the matches, for sure. And this. And that's all I need. The ashtray, the remote control, the paddle game, this magazine and the chair.
[walking outside]

And then it becomes apparent to me that want is not just a desire to possess, its a personal deficiency. A self imposed void. That I lack because I choose to want. That I deny my own perfect nature in order to seek something that 'complete's me, like a paddle game. Or an ashtray. Or bamboo hardwood floors. Or a 3rd garage stall to hold all that crap I bought that I can't throw away. The story of Eden lives anew when I think about the fruit from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Funny, just one blog ago I was ripping it. Shows you what I know... only that I don't. Well, Snow White's a nice story too. Also has fruit in it if that's important to you in a tale. Sorry... I digress. It just that our want has made us wanton.

Now my sainted ancestors, forebearers of a distant age, those people for whom I am the pinnacle of their existential lineage, those whose manifest decendent has it all, is no less content than they were before they left their respective motherlands. The journey of a thousand years. A battle against privation, war, racism, only to end up with the same want, neatly appointed in the suburbs, where I want a riding lawn mower. It would complete me... until I get a satellite dish. Or a paddle game...