I was chatting briefly just now with the Filipina lady who runs the mom and pop store on the corner. I was buying bananas and she wanted to know if I`d been on another trip lately as she knows that I tend to go away every year. When I mentioned that I`m starting to think about where I`m going next she reminded me how lucky I am and that there are many people who do not have the luxury of being able to travel every year nor anywhere at all. And for many years that privilege seemed well beyond my reach, as I mentioned to her.
I have made eight international trips in as many years, on an income that is perhaps just a little more than double what a welfare recipient would receive. I do have the good fortune of paying government subsidized rent to the tune of thirty percent of my earnings and that goes up or down every year with fluctuations in my pay. Otherwise I don`t think I have a particular talent in budgeting though many seem to think otherwise. I just don`t spend a lot of money.
I think I tend to spend little because I have always had so little. I have never been compulsive with money as I have always preferred having a roof over my head and food to eat. I have never understood why so many people have to have way more money to spend than they really need, which also often leads to debt. Neither have I ever understood the joy of shopping.
I have been a devout Christian for most of my life. It isn`t simply that I have long adhered to a set of doctrines or religious doctrines. Jesus got inside me at an early age and from the get-go I understood that the Christian life was no life at all unless it was free from materialism and consumerism. My freedom of spirit and soul mattered more than feeling the wind in my hair from a fancy model sports car (back in the days when I had hair) My sense of wealth never had anything to do with the size of my bank account and everything to do with the presence of love, peace and joy in my heart. I have always felt compelled to proclaim Christ to the world, not as a dogma, nor through words but through a holy and dedicated life from which would spring the waters of joy and life.
There were of course some very real obstacles that prevented me from moving forward professionally or economically. I couldn`t even finish college because I couldn`t afford it, not even with the measly student loans I could get, so I had to settle for a life of low-paying work. Unable to pay for vocational training I sought employment in which I could serve the neediest and the poorest among us, so I became a home support worker. The wage was always low, just a bit higher than minimum and the government was always cutting back on our funding and hours making this very precarious employment where I worked serving, caring for and cleaning up after the chronically and terminally ill, the dying and senior and others with physical and mental health disabilities. But I knew that God had called me into this work of love and mercy and I persevered. Eventually it became impossible for me to survive on my meagre earnings and minimum wage employers in the service and retail industry always chose immigrants over me, being a white male and therefore expected to do and be ``better``. I ended up homeless and traumatized. I eventually found housing, then after three and a half years on welfare found precarious employment.
Now I have been working as a mental health peer support worker for the past twelve years. The pay is abysmally low, twelve dollars an hour. Without social housing to live in I would not be able to survive in Vancouver. I still live modestly but feel in no way deprived. I have never owned nor known how to drive a car so I have always walked or relied on public transit. I am not addicted to anything so I don`t buy cigarettes or alcohol. I seldom eat in restaurants, preferring my own cooking, neither do I usually attend movies or concerts or plays as I don`t have time or a lot of interest or energy for vicarious entertainment. Life itself and other people have become for me so rich and fascinating that I don`t feel the need to live vicariously through various visual and performing artists, though I do appreciate good film and great theatre and music. I simply don`t need to be overstimulated.
My life is filled with prayer, stillness, music, thoughts books and words-a lot of them in Spanish-, my work with my clients, friends, art and writing and long meditative walks. I often feel surrounded by beauty. None of these are terribly expensive. I do not need the latest tech toys and I feel satisfied with my five year old laptop and my work cell phone (it is a flip-phone if you must know). I buy most of my clothes second hand and I eat vegetarian (meat is gross!). My life is already full and I feel like an incredibly rich person.
I eventually noticed that as I worked and didn`t need to spend a lot of money that my bank balance began to grow. I was soon thinking of travel. I got a new passport and booked a flight, my second visit, to Costa Rica. Then there was a back and forth for a few years between Mexico City and Costa Rica, then other parts of Mexico and finally two visits to Colombia where I stayed in Bogota. I have always managed to do well with pleasant but inexpensive accommodation in interesting places where I have met some wonderful people. I have improved my Spanish remarkably and have become much more familiar with the lives and cultures of the people who live in these countries.
I am planning another visit to Latin America. I am undecided as to where. I will say this much: never in my life have I felt so rich and so privileged, even now while I still live well below the poverty line in one of the most expensive cities on earth.
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