Really, anything could be a luxury, just perhaps not to you. As I sit here enjoying a warm cup of tea and eating a piece of dried pineapple I can’t help but think of the countless people in the world who have never sat down in their own home with a cup of tea (with milk! and sugar! the height of luxury in many places). I think of how strange it is that I have access to something as peculiar as a dried pineapple (which, by the way, if you haven’t tried it, is scrumptious). Not just pineapple, which is already a luxury (pineapples don’t grow in Canada so let’s not get started on the luxury of the Western supply chain) but the fact that it’s dry? It’s some niche good I can get at pretty much any bulk or health store spattered across my neighbourhood? Ridiculous.
This question can’t be answered honestly! The definition of luxury that we have in the West is based on a culture of consumption. The books I read are luxurious. The sweatshirt I’m wearing that keeps me warm is luxurious. BEING WARM IN A COLD CLIMATE IS LUXURIOUS! Being cool in a hot climate is luxurious! Fridges, dishwashers, washing machines, all these automated helpers that we take for granted are the HEIGHT of luxury. A home without water on the ground or leaking through the roof? Luxurious. A home with a door? Windows? A yard? A bed? A home at all? You see where I’m going with this.
So what’s the one luxury I can’t live without? I choose the people in my life. Because they too are a luxury. Not everyone lives in a community that fosters the kind of emotional freedom I’ve had to be able to mother the way I have and choose a partner like I’ve chosen. Happy children and a loving partner are the greatest luxury of my life that I simply can’t live without. But besides them?
Dried pineapple.
The Offline Mind 
Leave a comment