This week we celebrated the birthday of my brother, James, and I am once again reminded of a how in our quest for knowledge, for the latest gadget, for the biggest house on the block, or for the most exotic vacation, we have lost an appreciation for the simple things in life that make our lives the most meaningful.
Our celebration with James was very simple. James is a simple person. Many would look at him and think that because of his lack of mental acuity or linguistic skills he is missing something, but the simple truth is more times than not we are the ones that are missing out.
We took cupcakes to Hetlinger, the sheltered workshop where he works, for James to share with all the kids there. I call them kids although I think the correct term these days is “consumers’. I call them kids because that’s how they appear to me with their simple childlike faith and joyful appreciation of the most elementary of things.
In addition to the cupcakes, we took his favorite things, two helium filled balloons to the party. He smiled and blushed and it was worth all the money in the world to see him so happy. He was the big honcho for a few minutes, grinning, while everyone sang happy birthday to him, and commenting over and over again on the surprise.
I confess that the idea to take cupcakes to his workplace for everyone had never occurred to me before. Unbeknownst to me, several of the kids had previously shared cupcakes or cake on their birthdays and a month or so ago, Chrysanne, one of the supervisors there, told my husband that James had made a comment that, “My family would never do that for me.” I don’t know if he meant it as a challenge or if that was just the way he saw us, but we had to do something to remedy that situation.
It was worth it. After the party at Hetlinger, we took James to Casa Ramos for dinner. Going to dinner, especially at Casa Ramos, never gets old for him. They put the Mexican hat on his head and sang the usual birthday serenade and James was thrilled. A simple celebration, but we left a very happy man off at his apartment and went home completely satisfied.
The society we now find ourselves living in has over-complicated our lives and as a result has taken the joy out of living. So many the things that should ease our lives, such as computers and the Internet, have become a burden instead. Some of us are so caught up in the digital world, in our digital lives, that we ignore the simple pleasures around us. We take our phones with us everywhere we go, even to dinner. Can you imagine doing that when you were younger? My mother had a rule, “No books at the dinner table”, which was difficult because we were a family of readers. I can imagine how difficult the rule of “No cellphones at the dinner table”, would be to enforce now. They have become an extension of our selves. How sad and how complicating.
The complications of technology stretch to every part of our lives. This week I finally finished our income taxes. The doing of taxes is not so complicated, it’s the effort of getting them filed that was the source of my frustration this week. I spent at least an hour on the phone with the helpdesk trying to solve a transmission problem. And I was fortunate that in this instance the person I was communicating with spoke the same language which is not always been the case.
While the help desks may be populated with well-meaning individuals, when there is a significant language barrier it just complicates the issue. I was having problems with an application several weeks ago and it took me three tries to solve the issue. It was only when I spoke with someone located here in the United States that the issue was resolved. Sometimes I wish I could go back to the days of a pencil, paper, and adding machine to handle our financial transactions. It was probably more efficient than the means I use now which involves downloading, importing, and scrolling through endless lists of numbers on the computer screen.
We live in a material world and as such, we should expect that our lives have become more complicated, but it is still the simple pleasures that make life worthwhile: watching a robin try to build a nest, picking a bouquet of daffodils, seeing the smoke rise from the burning hills and watching a smile spread across the face of my intellectually challenged brother. Those are the simple things. Those are the things that make life worth living.