Economists claim that our troubles begin at $10,000 per year. Even Aristotle's scalpel would have balked at such precision, but the fact is that that is when we start buying 'white goods'. It is the astrological number which multinationals hope the Chinese and Vietnamese peasant's income will reach to augment theirs to astronomical figures. The rational part of Chinese and Vietnamese society - the state - had hitherto contained needs within the pale of the sufficient, furnishing citizens with health, education and safety. But the paradox of civilisation begins where common sense and sanity end. Civilisation rests, not on contentment, but on 'getting and spending'. To envy the Jones's their new washing machine, and Jones Junior his straight As, betokens sensibility apparently far removed from the hyena circling around the lion's lunch. Should we marvel then at the Cynics and the hippies, the Rousseaus and the Gauguins, sensitive souls that pilgrimaged towards incorporeal spirit, but found the altar crowded with genuflections before idolatrous matter? "We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon."
Consequently, we have to learn to be happy; which requires us to unlearn some lessons inculcated by our elders and teachers, no doubt with the best of intentions but the worst of consequences. For who would not want his children to be happy? Yet happiness, we have learnt, must always be postponed, in grotesque confusion with money that must be saved. The fridge we finally got last year; and tomorrow we'll have that TV set; next year, the iPOD; and - heaven of heavens! - a flat some day in which to put all this detritus of the years. Yet behind the painted veil of life lie 'Hope and Fear - twin destinies, who ever weave/ The shadows the world calls substance....' We sacrifice, first, the lining of our stomachs to worry; next we dedicate an artery; we pay homage to tomorrow by raising our blood pressure. We have no time for solace, no time for Horace.
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