I tried really hard to write a blog this morning when I first got up. I just couldn't get it right. I knew what I wanted to say, but I just couldn't type the right words in the right order. So, I simply gave up for the day.
We're just about to go out and go to a movie and I checked my emails. There was only one. It was from a reader who said that she loved my blog and looked forward to reading it but sometimes found my writing hard to read. First as a large woman, as a wheelchair user, she identifies a lot with what I write about. Second, she sometimes worries that my days are dominated by some of the nasty things that happen when difference meets prejudice.
So she asked me if I could do a blog that listed 5 of my guilty pleasures. Just for fun and just to get to know a different side of my life. She said that none of these could have to do with work or with advocacy. I immediately thought of a few so, I'm going to give it a shot:
5 Guilty Pleasures
1) Books. I love to read. Now that's a pleasure, an intense pleasure but not a guilty pleasure. My guilty pleasure is buying a hard back book, when it first comes out, because I can't bear to wait for the paperback. 95% of the books I read are paperbacks. Any of the 5% that are hardback will tell you a story of authors I really like or books that I've been desperate to read. I just finished Tom Rob Smith's "The Farm." One of the most compassionate books I've ever read. I won't even think of lending anyone my hardback copy of Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe - a book I found intensely moving. So, hardbacks - guilty pleasure.
2) DVD sets. Joe and I watch little broadcast television. We prefer box sets. Mostly we watch BBC stuff but we also enjoy some American programs. For example right now we are watching Oz and the second season of a great Australian series Jack Irish. We really get into the series and some we keep to watch again like Y Gwyll ("Hinterland" in English) and Deadwood. The cost of these can add up, but I don't drink and I don't smoke so ... what the hell.
3) Museum Memberships. I love museums and I love supporting them. We are members of the Royal Ontario Museum and the Gardiner Museum and our membership has lapsed at the AGO, something that we'll take care of on our next visit. We love wandering around and spending time just being in the presence of such beauty and such talent and such history. And, most of them have good places for lunch.
4) Butter Tarts. I'm diabetic. Rare treat. Enough said.
5) Tom Ford's Noir. I like the whole line of Noir but I particularly like the after shave balm. It's amazingly smooth and makes my skin feel great. (I can't believe I'm writing this.) It's ridiculously costly so I don't use it all the time, I don't use it for every shave, I use it sparingly. More and more places are 'scent free' so I don't wear the cologne much (my second favourite scent is Autograph by Marks and Spencer), I tend to run out of the balm and the deodorant most quickly.
So, there.
Five guilty pleasures.
I do realize, as I write this, that I often document things that are dark. Let me assure you, all of you, that my life is also full of light. Lots of light. I live, I love, I laugh ... most of the time. But, for what I want to do with the blog, which is chronicle my life as a man with differences and disabilities ... I need to and want to be truthful to that experience. (And if you look closely, my freshly shaved cheek, looks awful good, while I'm having those experiences.)
12 comments:
Yes, you do look good, Dave! And this: "Let me assure you, all of you, that my life is also full of light. Lots of light." That makes me happy.
Mine are
1. Fancy toilet paper (extra soft)
2. Paper towels (I know it's not good for the environment, but using them reliably keeps my place clean without falling behind)
3. Air conditioning (from when I was a little girl, a promise I made to myself)
4. Sturdy notebooks
5. Organic textures wherever possible: stone, woodgrain, silk, wool
Mine are:
1. slinky clothing from the thrift store. Often these are things I can't actually wear anywhere (at my age etc) except at camping festivals far from home, but I love finding them, and finding they fit, and the feel of silky fabric on my skin.
2. Books. These days I'm actually catching up a little on my TBR pile, but I just bought 5 more anyway.
3. The loom that takes up half my living room. Even though everything I make on it would be cheaper if I bought it already woven.
4. Sun hats. Oh, I know I have to wear them (pale skin vs sunburn) -- but they don't have to be this nice or look this good. My current favorite gets compliments everywhere I go (which I bask in).
5. The occasional massage.
Books are on my list as well. In no particular order, another 4 are Reese's peanut butter cups, collecting stuffed animals, the show Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and The Price is Right. Oh, and an extra one: bad puns.
-- Littlewolf
1. fancy non-utilitarian moisturiser smothered on my feet.
2. eating all the leftover potatoes.... I love potatoes...
3. sex that makes me (nearly) late for work.
4. doing sudoku or playing solitaire or mah-jong when I could be doing something useful
5. ok this is anonymous so I will admit to it... going half-and-half with two different toothpaste flavours for a new flavour sensation.
My animal friends.
Books.
Massages.
Meditation.
Sleep
I have commented on your write-ups when I recognize a 'disabled' situation I have experienced because it has been so nice to find out I am not alone out here. Many times I nod and get a laugh because it is familiar, typical and just keeps happening. Maybe I can call your blog one of my guilty pleasures. Thanks, Dave.
For some years now I've been doing my best to remember not to feel guilty about my pleasures. It's such a pervasive idea within our culture, that pleasure is sinful, that investing resources in pleasure is a wicked indulgence, and that we as individuals somehow don't deserve niceness.
It's the thinking that led to me, in the early days of having a care package, ending up giving most of the money *back* to Social Services because, while I felt that I could justify using it to pay for support to do Necessary Grown Up Things like going to the bank, a bit of me felt that paying for support to take a leisurely trundle around the park or a cup of tea in a cafe would result in an auditor leaping out at me asking what the heck I thought I was doing.
Your link for Oz is wrong [it goes to the link for "The Farm"]. If you're talking about the show about the prison - that's a pretty amazing show. Parts of it are hard to watch - kind of ironic to point out, given your reader's comment - and it has some glaring flaws, but overall it is incredibly well done on all.
Moose, I fixed that link! Thanks
Love your list!!!!I recently read The Farm and loved it.
Are you still a Y/R fan??!!
1. Sushi lunch for one. Hang the expense. I don't share, either.
2. Pedicures. Oh My Word. Nothing so luxurious as having your feet scrubbed and buffed and moisturized and massaged.
3. Excellent tequila. When you drink sparingly, it needs to be an event.
4. Gym membership. My body is worth it.
5. Very Bad Reality TV. It's all silly and contrived and mind-rotting but I love it anyway.
Sue
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