Post date: Dec 27, 2017 6:44:14 PM
Here is what I think my life is about. I’ve had 78 years to think about this and do something about it. Just thinking about life does not count.
Work: For the most part I have enjoyed what I do. For enjoying myself I have been rewarded (paid) well. I have saved enough so that I could retire (three times) and still live well. Because I didn’t ‘work’ for this money (I was having fun) I don’t feel that my savings are mine to waste. So I don’t buy a lot of toys (that someone must dispose of after I die) or travel - which leaves little residue, but tends to use the money rapidly.
My health is reasonably good. Poor health can use money very rapidly. I refuse to spend more on my health than my annual income. I have friends who have spent far more than I have saved on keeping a partner alive for a few months. Not just their money, but society’s money. Not my style.
I traveled considerably when younger. I lived for two years in Nigeria and rode 17,000 miles on my (little by US standards, big by African standards) motorcycle. I lived and worked for a year in Germany. I spent a summer in the Amazon jungle. I made numerous trips to Mexico and Nicaragua, and lived two 3-month stints in Nicaragua. But my traveling time is over. I now hesitate to drive three hours round trip to Santa Fe to go shopping.
I had a good marriage. We struggled for a few years, but living successfully with someone requires work. We alternatively put each other through more education. The two of us cooperated on a lot of projects. Carol had ideas. I helped make many of them real.
Community is important to me. I investigated residential communities since 1967. We visited the Weston (Vermont) Benedictine priory in the early 1970s. After 1983 we visited Benedictine nuns in Cuernavaca, Morelos, at least once a year. We studied Spanish and I got to the point where I could read Bible lessons in Spanish. Carol said Mass for those (Roman Catholic) sisters in Spanish. I lived with the Jubilee House Community in Nicaragua for a month. I built a house in a tight-knit neighborhood where we dine together at least three times monthly.
Supporting one another is important to me. Since moving to Taos I have helped start a virtual ‘elder village’. While a number of the elderly in Taos are rich retirees, many of these move to the big city when they become ill and infirm. I’m more interested in helping the poor elderly who become isolated by their infirmities.
I rubbed elbows with poverty on a number of occasions: in Africa, Mexico, and Nicaragua. Even on the streets of Seattle. Not the poverty of refugees such as the Rohingya living in Bangladesh, but more than the homeless who sleep under the bridge. I’ve also experienced how friendly some cultures can be. I was amazed that Nicaraguans can be friendly towards north Americans after we paid for a civil war in the 1980s.
I want my estate to go where it will improve the world. I figure I can do more good in a place that starts closer to the bottom than here in the US. Nicaragua is the second-poorest nation in the western hemisphere (after Haiti). Yet it has nearly the lowest homicide rate, even though it is next door to El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala. I won’t meddle in politics, but I can support education. I might be able to put five kids through university in the US, but that same amount would improve the education of hundreds of kids in Central America.
I can’t take it with me, and I don’t want to use up my savings on myself. I want the benefit to be the most it can be. I will not have control over how it is used after I’m dead, but I won’t know the difference, will I?