Picture it: a little seaside village where the sun is high in the sky. Gentle breezes circulate, riffing along the streets and tousling the hair of the happy wanderers as they walk amongst the cafés or turn down to the beach, squinting at the water or looking at the small island off the coast, highly visible and clear and green on such a fine day – it looks very close, as if you could swim to it.
Good weather doesn’t come so often here, but we had this day a couple of weeks ago. I saw it from behind the slatted blinds of my little room, seeing patients while the day outside warmed up, blistering, and in the afternoon I felt the temperature cooling to a lovely clemency, still warm.
When I got out, the sting in the heat was gone, and so too was the advantage in the day. I was too tired to seize the last couple of hours of daylight, and I retreated home, without getting the benefit from the sun.
I believe in having seasons in your life, in hibernating when times are tough, but also in making hay while the sun shines, and I value spontaneity. If the day is sunny I want to be able to enjoy it and if a family member is sick I want to be able to visit them, without grovelling to an employer, and if the soccer is on or the rugby world cup is coming up, you better believe I won’t be working.
Not long ago, I thought I was done – I had enough to get by and work occasional shifts. I had a charmed existence, with protracted periods of staring at walls and waking late and doing whatever I felt like. But then, of course, circumstances intervened, forcing me, begrudgingly, back into the labour market.
As a longtime renter, I loved the flexibility, the ease of moving and the fact that I wasn’t tethered to a house anywhere. Eventually, something changed in my neurochemistry, and I started to want a home. Maybe it’s the accumulation of the anno domini, maybe it was Covid and the lockdowns, maybe it’s my uncontrollable lust for a home gym, but I wanted a place of my own.
I wanted to not be worried about landlords seeing the holes in doorframes where I secretly screwed in pull-up bars; to not have to read passive-aggressive group Whatsapp messages from housemates, to not have to live in a house where a party is going on when I don’t want to be at a party, or to be afraid of using the kitchen or taking over the TV when someone else needs it.
These realisations, of course, came in time for the hottest housing market in a very long time. And with expensive houses come big mortgages, and with big mortgages come the necessity to pretend to be fully employed, in ‘permanent’ roles, so as to fool the evil banks, before quitting as soon as the drawdown is completed.
So that means I’ll someday say goodbye to full-time employment, to living my life on the terms of my employer, and to orientating my geographic location, my temperament, and my hours of rising and retiring, around work. But first, there’s a bit of grinding to be done again, which I hope will make it all the sweeter, when I can stand outside in the sun any day I want, when it deigns to shine on this little island.