Hello again. It’s been a while. Well, two months, but two months is a long time in Vanilla. In the meantime I’ve written 3.5 draft Vanillas and not sent any of them. Why not? Sometimes because I can’t quite figure out what I’m trying to say, othertimes because I feel like I’m pushing out newsletters about sex and gender when I have all this other stuff on my mind about psychology and capitalism and climate change that I (also) really want to write about.
The initial premise of Vanilla was that I found myself, against all odds, in the most normative of relationships, confused as fuck. I did what any weird writer person would do and started a newsletter in an attempt to unpack my confusion and disrupt heteronormativity with words. I still have a lot of thoughts about all that. But I also have a lot of other thoughts, about norm-challenging at large. So I’ve decided to go a bit off script and squeeze some more milk out of the the “social norms” part of my newsletter description.
If you’re just here for the sexy gender stuff, fear not, there’ll be plenty of that coming your way, but for now, here are some words about work, money and an alternative way of life.
Some years ago I had a boss who would begin salary negotiations by asking the question “What do you need?” He reasoned that his own salary, and that of some of the others employed in the company, was higher than mine because his needs were greater, he had bought a house and a car and had a kid. Meanwhile I was just me, living in a tiny box room in a tiny apartment I shared with two other 20-somethings. It enraged me, of course. At the time I was very bothered by that fact that some of the men in our supposedly flat-hierarchy company were getting much higher salaries than me. And I doubted I would have got a pay raise if I took out a loan for a massive apartment and adopted a child.
That aside, when I think about it, “What do you need?” has been pretty much how I’ve conducted my financial life ever since. Initially because I didn’t have much money—after quitting that job I spent several years madly running a company that never really made a profit, and I was so mentally and socially exhausted by it that I needed to live alone, so I moved out of my tiny box room into a tiny box apartment I couldn’t afford. “Need”, then, involved staying on friends’ floors or in my tent at weekends so that I could AirBnb my apartment, with a little bit of money left over to buy oats, rye bread, eggs, lentils, rice, oil, garlic, onions and tinned tomatoes.
This was a desperate kind of need, that was in no way mentally sustainable, but over time, as my money situation has swung up and down, the “What do you need?” principle has stuck—only now it has evolved into a way of life that actually works for me.
need
Commonly confused with want, need is used to describe a necessity, or something that must be done, in order for something else to happen. In terms of basic human needs—food, water, shelter and clothing—that “something else” is generally an acceptable quality of life. Quality of life, and thereby need, is very subjective. Everything from clean water to a Netflix subscription (or access to one) can be a considered a need, depending on your prerogative.
What isn’t subjective is that we—the small minority of humans living in “developed” countries—have long since gone well beyond satisfying our needs, and now live in an abundance of want, which is often touted as the cause of our excessive extraction of the planet’s natural resources, not to mention the continued extortion of the world’s less wealthy humans.
My current “needs” include as much time as possible to write and make art, good food, good sex, occasional trips to visit my friends and family, podcasts, library access, a very cheap phone contract, the clothes and furniture I already have, the occasional secondhand buy (usually balanced out with a secondhand sale), a largeish apartment that I share with my partner, internet, electricity, water, fresh air, meditation, a winter bathing membership, regular Bowspring classes and enough spare cash for emergencies because I don’t have any insurance.
In order to satisfy all those needs, I need to work (as in, for money) approximately four hours a week (which in practice looks more like 30 hours every other month).
Four hours of work a week and I have the life I want. All my needs and wants are met.
Now I’m not saying this is the ideal setup for everyone—nor is it possible for everyone, as not everyone can pimp themselves out as a translator/writer for a decent hourly wage (although a fairer society that also provided universal basic income could make it possible), and not everyone is as able-bodied, child-free, anti-insurance or as unbothered about alcohol or eating out at restaurants as I am.
What I am saying is, perhaps “What do you need?” is a good place to start after all. Not so your boss can get away with paying you a lower salary than you deserve, but so your time is once again yours to decide what to do with. And sure, there would probably be some people who, faced with that question, would still opt for the 40-hours-a-week, crazy-high-salary life. I just doubt it would be as many people who currently find themselves in that setup—that is, I doubt that many people would choose it if we lived in a society where “full time work” wasn’t the norm (soon, my pretties).
Money is not the goal. Time is. And yes yes, money buys time, but what about all the time you use buying money?
Optional toppings
☯️ Anti-arbejde: Afmontér kapitalismen! Sig dit job op, the Poptillægget episode that made me realise that my way of life might (finally!) be trending
🍭 My Prerogative by Britney Spears, the only reason I know of the existence of that word
💩 On the Phenomenon of Bullshit Jobs by David Greber for STRIKE! Magazine in 2013, which went on to become this book
🛌 The Nap Ministry asks the poignant question: how will you be useless to capitalism today?
🌎 Can the universal basic income solve global inequalities? by Erik Olin Wright for UNESCO Inclusive Policy Lab
⛔️ Seaspiracy on Netflix, which will probably make you conclude that you don’t need fish, but don’t let that put you off watching it
🔥 @AmyAchenbach on twitter
Written with love, during some of the 164 hours I won’t spend working (for money) this week.
— H. E.