Truly Local

Five years ago I set out from the only home I’d ever known (college dorms/apartments don’t count) to make my way to North Carolina. I spent all summer readying myself for that move, in addition to sleeping and playing WoW. As I was winnowing down my remaining possessions to a small stack of boxes and clothes, I worried about all the things that would confront me in my new environment: getting and furnishing a new place, making friends, and other general grad school apprehensions. This trip was meticulously planned; I planned my route, got a hotel room, calculated how much gas I would use and decided how often I would stop. I had even calculated how long exactly I would spend driving through South Carolina, possibly one of the most important facts to know, as anyone who has driven through there can attest. I even knew exactly when I was meeting my landlord at my new little studio apartment/hobbit hole to get the key and that after meeting her, I would have enough time to go shop for a bed before the stores closed.

On the day itself, I packed everything I owned into my Corolla, waved goodbye to my mom and hit the road. I made it all the way to the bottom of our street before I had to stop. Apparently loading up the front seat without closing the seatbelt triggers a beeping alarm. So after a brief awkward moment of fumbling in the front seat, I was truly off. That trip and my first few days in North Carolina, a longer story in which our hero learns the value of perseverance and cleaning products, were some of the most liberating experiences I have ever had. I’m a relatively solitary person by nature, but never before have I been so completely on my own. Everything else of consequence I have ever done has been as part of a group or with the assistance of others: Boy Scout achievements, up to and including my Eagle Project, all my science experiments, even the various competitions and such I participated in. I was proud of myself for doing that whole trip solo, for the first time, I really felt like an adult.

A year or so ago, I was talking to my parents over a Christmas visit and mentioned, in passing, how this trip had made me feel independent. Halfway through, my mom couldn’t hide her smile anymore and said, “If that’s how you remember it.” And that’s when I realized that this defining moment of adulthood independence was anything but. While I had only seen my parts of the puzzle, I hadn’t appreciated how my independence was underwritten by others. I drove up in, what had been until a few days previous, my sister’s car. My maps were courtesy of my parent’s AAA membership. The hotel I stopped at was paid for with my points from my Dad’s frequent travels. To me, this trip was an exercise in establishing my autonomy, but from my parents’ perspective, it was merely a cute attempt to seem independent.

Locally meaningful is all we can really hope for in our independence. Unless you are drinking your own urine out in the wilderness, in which case I think it is safe to say that you are not among my readers, you are not independent. Your choices are constrained; available options depend on the actions of others. The economic and social position we find ourselves in makes it seem like our choices exist free and without linked dependencies, but the best to which we can aspire is the belief that our choices exist absent other forces. And as someone who enjoys electricity, books and even, on occasion (control your amazement) the company of other people-I think I can live with that.

Every two weeks a common pool of suckers get together and create new posts on the same topic. This week’s synchroblog posts about “Independence” are listed below. Check them out to see, you know, better writing.
Escape Velocity: Part III: WordShepherd
Hypothetically Speaking: nightsbrightdays
Independence: The Rebel I
The Thing Itself: plow and rain
interbeing: art, etcetera
Fear Itself: i write to be rid of things
Bodily Interruption: passionately pensive
Co-Dependence: muddledreamer