the burden of ownership

I’m thinking of buying a (very old, very cheap, very small) sailboat. Would you sail with me around here, on local lakes? – Ed asks.

That depends. If the wind is just right, if the water isn’t too rough, if the air is warm, if...

So, maybe?

For Ed, ownership is emotionally taxing. He misses sailing, but to leap again into owning a boat is so oppressive that he’ll use any excuse to postpone buying.



It’s April still. The shower month. Today, we had grumpy, rumbling dark skies and bursts of clammy rain.





The kind you’ll run into any store to avoid.

I darted into the mall on my way to the last evening of moonlighting at the shop. I had been writing exam questions all day and for once I was happy that I could do nothing more on this day except sell, for one last time, creams and soaps from the south of France.

Passing an eyeglass frame store at the mall, I considered buying new frames. I thought how I truly would love new frames. I would feel no burden of ownership. Like Ed, I am not an acquirer, but unlike Ed, I like new designs in the same way that I love new destinations.

But filling my free days with new destinations (and maybe replacing old frames with new ones) is what forced me to take on extra work. Work I am finally letting go of.

I tell the eyeglass frame store person that I’ll come back tomorrow.

In the shop on the corner I try hard to forget how un-oppressive owning new glasses would feel.