Since last fall, Claire Wolfe has been MFA (Missing From Activism) and 'presumed happy' as she pursues what Henry David Thoreau called "the business of living" which properly is the main business of life itself. I understand Claire's desire to pursue greater anonymity in which her own daily freedom is paramount. Believe me, I understand!

Although I continue to address politics WRIT LARGE, for the few years my focus has been shifting to personal freedom. Some of your freedoms and some of mine are so intimately connected that I do draw a distinction between fighting for them or mine; for example, free speech must exist for all within a society or it exists for none. Nevertheless, there are practical differences between what frees your life and what frees mine; for example, I don't smoke and, so, fighting for your right to smoke doesn't materially improve my life...indeed, since I hate secondhand smoke, it might harm my life. (BTW, I still agree with smokers' rights and argue against a mandated ban.) In a sense, politicial activism by those who do not thereby seek money or power is an odd thing because, often, activists fight for rights that don't touch their real lives. An extreme example would be fighting against policies in a distant country -- e.g. the one-child policy in China. Yet the true political activist does so and is 'paid' by a sense that the cause is just. When you lose that sense of satisfied justice or come to believe that making a difference is not possible...well, maybe that's what they call 'burn out.'

I don't feel burned out. But I do doubt that it is possible right now to make a real difference within the broad society. These are the "crazy years" and they are going to become crazier in the foreseeable future due to terrible economic times ahead. Poverty and despair are the enemies of personal freedom -- not only because poor, desperate people will steal and otherwise grab for what they can but also because they hold personal freedoms cheaply as compared to a tank of gas or food. They want a paternalistic government; they want strongman leaders; they want religion and guarantees; they hate the rich; they are suspicious of economic freedom because they have been taught it caused their poverty. They clamor to the State for safety.

So how does someone who values freedom highly allocate that precious, irreplaceable resource of time. As it becomes more difficult and dangerous to change society, it becomes more appealing to turn inward where matters are more susceptible to control. Any time spent advocating the rights of others (e.g. those of parents) is taken away from the very specific personal freedoms I am trying to retain in my own daily life (e.g. privacy). Often there is not a clear, clean overlap in the rights I advocate and my private life. For example, I am not a parent.

Picasso claimed that all acts of creation begin with an act of destruction. I started by destroying the chains that bound me and bind most people to a 9-to-5 rut with a 2 hour commute during which their sparkle erodes to shadow. Even work you love -- as I love to write -- can become a job at which to make money and, then, you lose more than money can ever replace. Too often, the soul-killing lifestyle is pursued for luxuries like cars, designer clothes, eating in pricey restaurants, or impressive houses. I don't disparage luxuries -- indeed, I demand them; I just don't consider the foregoing to be luxiuries or even the trappings of a good life. My luxuries include having time to be with family, to read, to explore my hobby of ethnic cooking, to see how far I can take yoga, to walk on land I own and sink my fingers into its soil in Spring... Most of the luxuries I crave are not only inexpensive, some of them (cooking and gardening) are money savers.

One of the first ideas I destroyed was the idea that luxuries need to be expensive. High pressured professionals who work themselves toward a coronary will plop down a small fortune to take two weeks off and fish in pristine waters. I only have to open my front door and walk the perimeter of my farm to get lost in woods, or by a stream, or in a growing field. Yet a Manhattan lawyer will view me as his economic inferior because I can't afford his vacation and the car he uses to drive there. I am his inferior, if you measure worth by raw income. If you measure by satisfaction, relaxation, health and extended life span, etc....he is the one living in poverty.

A difference between his view and mine, however, is that he usually throws in a moral assessment: he is a better human being because he has more what society values. I don't make a similar "you are worth less than me" evaluation. What would be a rat race to me could be Nirvana to him. I honestly don't know and I don't want to know. I just want both us to be free to make our respective choices. This one freedom is still available to most of us. Within the boundaries of our own lives, we can choose the things and experiences upon which we wish to spend time and money.