It’s December, and as of yesterday, I had no plane ticket to go home. Today I am borrowing miles to book one.
When I moved to this country, I promised myself I would be home for every Christmas, and that if the going ever got too rough, I would just get on a plane, whether to take a deep breath, like coming up for air when eyeing the fish on the ocean floor, or for good. But then I married an American, and I learnt the true meaning of compromise, and I also woke up to find I had roots firmly planted in this soil.
Last night a friend of Alan’s popped by for a glass of ruby-red Kumara. He is an Aussie, living in Manhattan. He told me that is costs him $25,000 to fly his family of 6 home for the holidays. This threw me off kilter completely. In all my visions of going back and forth for some grandparent time, I hadn’t ever calculated selling off my unborn children to get my existing ones back on to South African ground.
Sometimes that $25,000 is just worth it, though. In fact, a trip “home” can be priceless. Money, and the value we place behind it is so emotionally charged. Times like this morning when Alan explained to me that some employees working for not-for-profits in this country (cough: Harvard) make as much as $5 million a year to manage their funds. Let me see, if 80% of this population is excited about Obama’s new tax plan because they make less than $200,000 a year, shouldn’t excessive earnings be an area we ought to tackle pronto. If the CEOs of the big 3 automakers suggested they take only $1 in remuneration for 2008 as part of ther bailout plan, how much of a cushion do they already have? While I like to think of myself as a free-market capitalist, this is a case where the system is clearly failing. While I am not sure how I feel about government-mandated charity, and I definitely don’t think the rich ought to be punished for being rich, and making money is healthy for everyone in the end, excessive anything still needs to raise the flag. When homeopathy isn’t healing your cancer, even the medicineman is going to make that appointment for chemo.
My mother thinks we live an excessive lifestyle in America, and while I don’t think we do, I guess we don’t have as raw and natural a lifestyle as my friends back in South Africa do. We do fly to places to catch a fleeing sun. I buy milk that’s short on lactose for double the price. Most San Franciscans eat out more than they cook.
Sometimes convenience is worth its price tag.
And if I believe that, I suppose, it’s a good thing this expat is recharging my South Africaness again back ”home” shortly.
