I wrote about the happiness index and Colombia a while back, but it's interesting to hear it leaking into the North American discourse on how we choose to live. Even more interesting because the boy and I had a conversation about that very thing last night, and then I woke up and he'd sent me this link: Dave Pollard on Colombia and happiness.
How we choose to live here can be problematic. Our meagre by US standards salaries allow us to live comfortably -- I never worry about money here, while in the states it's just about the only thing I worry about. And I'm not a person who is motivated particularly by money or who wants to make lots of it, just that I have bills to pay and the Westside shack to maintain, and no dollars to speak of to take care of those responsibilities. So I worry sometimes. But in Colombia, in a capital city in which half the population lives below the poverty line, we never worry about having enough money. So we are living a reality apart from that of most of the people around us. On the other hand, some of us are living in rich neighborhoods surrounded by the country's elite, which raises a different sort of existential dilemna.
At the same time, as Americans from an uber-scheduled society, we can learn a lot from how people live here, which I think is Pollard's point. Here's what I see as the main difference: when you spend time with friends or family, you don't have a schedule. You just enjoy. That's not to say that people don't work hard, because I've seen it, and they do. But there is a much stronger differentiation between work and play that we are learning to appreciate.
At the central park yesterday, we stayed for hours, playing ultimate frisbee, kicking the many stray soccerballs that came our way back to their owners, watching kids fly hundreds of kites, and just soaking in the sunny day.
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