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Sunday, March 07, 2004
Estremera: Live life, not work
By Stella A. Estremera
Spider's Web
The reality that I will not be able to buy more books if I didn't have a job, however, is enough to let me hold on even at the risk of losing my sanity. I could only look longingly at my bookshelf as I type these words, tempted to call it a night instead and snuggle in bed (or even just the office couch) with Book No. 1.
IF you love books, you'll understand the torture I'm going through now.
After more than a month of impatient waiting, a shipment of books I ordered from a friend in Canada who works at Random House arrived last week. She sent 25 brand new books for me with that distinct smell of ink and paper still clinging to them, two of which are hardbound and 14 of which are by one of my favorite authors. (Actually there are 28, but the three other small books are like bonuses describing and illustrating characters of the 14 with free giant posters of these characters... excuse me while I wipe off my drool).
Work, however, has been snapping at my heels since the year of the monkey dawned this year and all I could spare is one short chapter twice a day when I take a break to clear my mind and two or three chapters before bedtime. At this rate I'm not even halfway yet through my first book and there are 13 others to tackle, plus the 11 others by three different authors whom I haven't yet encountered until last week but whose synopses at the back read so very much like my other favorites. The temptation to quit the job is really great.
The reality that I will not be able to buy more books if I don't have a job however is enough to let me hold on even at the risk of losing my sanity.
I could only look longingly at my bookshelf as I typed these words, tempted to call it a night instead and snuggle in bed (or even just the office couch) with Book No. 1. But I know I can't. The reason why I can fill up my shelves with books is because I have a job. Remove my job, then I won't have books and that will be a greater torture. (Match that with the fact that I'm the type who wants to collect and keep and yes occasionally run my hands lovingly over the covers of my favorites such that I don't really like investing time in borrowed books, then that scratches out borrowing for me).
I remembered a time more than a decade ago when a friend made the mistake of folding and putting a long crease mark on the cover of my "Fellowship of the Ring" Special Silver Jubilee Edition. I ranted and raved at him and swore never to lend him any of my books ever again. I never did. (Talk about being rabid...)
My heart broke when rats nipped at the backs of my hardbound Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone as well as the second volume, The Chamber of Secrets, after I tried to poison them two years ago. I never bought any rat poison since then and just made sure I always have a cat at home.
Definitely, the poorhouse with no means to collect books with the smell of ink still clinging to them will be a torture chamber. That coming from a person who can live with just one meal a day (after forgetting the two others) is saying a lot.
It's situations like this that drag me back to the reality that my life isn't my work. We, adults, whether wage earners or entrepreneurs, do tend to allow that to happen sometimes such that we work from day to day, toiling, making money, and then barely having time for any other endeavor because there is work to be done. Before we know it we have allowed work to become our life and we're too old to get back that life we have wanted to have, the very reason we were working for.
Those with children work to provide well for the children: the best food, school, dresses, every material thing money from working can buy. So busy do we make ourselves to ensure all these such that the next time we really take some time to look and appreciate, the children are all grown up and no longer want to be coddled, pampered and dressed up the way we would have wanted. They've just become slouchy, grouchy, grungy teenagers you can barely grab a hold of. Lost time; never to be retrieved.
The singles among us get in the same rut. Work for a pad, a car, the latest gizmo and gadgets, and then realize as we approach midlife or even retirement age that all those cars, pads, and gizmos have been used to tide us over through or for the next day's work.
Pathetic, no?
And so I drill into my consciousness every once in a while that my work is my means to get what I want: books and fun, among them. Slaving in front of the computer, while sometimes it takes hours and hours of my time, is not what I'm living for. Thus, while my friends and officemates believe I'm stuck in here, I do slip out and streak towards adventure when they're not looking, sneaking back in as if I've just been out for a snack.
Friday night I was just staring at my books while peeking a glance at the calendar, looking forward to my two Sundays scheduled leave when I can dive once more and explore the depths as well as get a few more chapters or volumes over with. And yes... I did sneak an hour off before ending this piece, turning the pages of Book No. 1 because the temptation was just too strong to resist. Bliss!
(E-mail: ikik@myway.com)
(March 7, 2004 issue)
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