Heartless Capitalism Revisited

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Some fifty years ago, I wrote a column for the local newspaper on Heartless Capitalism to run on Valentine’s day.  Faculty in the economics department at Clemson University took turns writing columns once a week.  I told Russell, our coordinator, that I would like to write a column for Valentine’s Day with the title Heartless Capitalism. “What’s it about?” he asked. “I don’t know yet, ”I replied. It turned out endorse a popular theme in political economy of that era, presaging Ronald Reagan as well as the movie Wall street in which Gordon Gecko proclaims that greed is good.

My argument was based on the basic focus of economics, efficiency. In a world of scarce resources and unlimited wants, economists bow at the altar of efficiency.Efficiency means accomplishing the most (output, enjoyment, satisfaction, etc.) our of our available resources OR spending the smallest amount of resources in order to achieve a given outcome.  We taught our students that the goals of microeconomics were efficiency, equity, and freedom, but really only efficiency mattered, We could demonstrate how efficiency was attained with graphs and equations. 

Efficiency is not really a goal, more a way of attaining a goal, which is MORE—economic growth.Moreover, efficiency depends on greed as a motivator.. One way to be more efficient—to get more “stuff” out of your available inputs—is to use relatively more of resources that are abundant and less of the resources that are scarce., because abundant resources are cheap and scarce resources are expensive When land is scarce, we cultivate by methods that focus on yields per acre. When copper is scarce, we substitute other materials. when capital is scarce we use less capital and more labor. And so on. You get the picture. That is how economist’s explain the statement that greed is good. If greed is abundant and altruism is scarce, why not harness the abundant resource of greed to produce more output or produce it at lower cost? 

“Greed is good” became the mantra of  many economists as way to create and sustain economic growth. Greed is good weas a necessary condition for the implied goal, more is better.   I never went that far.  I had read Schumacher’s Small is Beautiful (!973).  Much latter, I read Alan Blinder’s 1990 book hard Heads, Soft Hearts in which he argued that the Republicans were the party of hard heads, hard hearts and the Democrats were the party of soft heads, soft hearts, What we really needed was hard heads, soft hearts. Efficiency is about hard heads. Equity about soft heads, caring about others, compassion, or altruism. Greed is a powerful motivator, but altruism needs to keep it in check.

Both greed and altruism are learned attitudes, embedded in the culture in which one is raised.  Like so many dimensions of life, greed and altruism are not either-or but rather both-and. Greed makes us wealthy. Altruism makes us us better persons and provides us with a world that is more safe, pleasant, and sustainable than greed alone can create.. Greed begets material wealth but at a high unaccounted cost in terms of social relations, equity, and the earth.

As you celebrate this holiday of the heart, listen to both head and heart as you navigate your balance between work and play, being and becoming, giving and getting, earning and caring. Your bottom line needs to be aligned with your lifeline.

Black History Month

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Black History Month succeeded Negro History Month which was established in 1926. Exhibits, readings, displays, and other events remind us of our “favorite” black leaders. Black history gets the shortest month of the year, so we need to celebrate fast. It is followed by Women’s History Month in March and Pride Moth in June, leaving the other nine moths to presumably celebrate Cis-gendered white male contributions to our history.

Although I was born in Connecticut, I have spent most of my adult life in my adopted state of South Carolina.  I teach a short course for the Osher Lifelong Learning Center called “South Carolinians Who Should Be Famous but Aren’t’.” One of my favorites is a black man named Robert Smalls. I learned this story from a colleague in the history department at Clemson University. j was teaching an interdisciplinary honors course on risk and asked Alan Schaffer to give two lectures on great risk takers in history. I don’t remember who the other hero was, but Robert Smalls was unforgettable.

Robert Smalls was born in Beaufort in 1839, the son of a house slave. He grew up with his master’s son as a playmate.  When the master died, Robert became the property of his childhood playmate. They moved to Charleston and Robert was rented out to work on ships.  He was a hard worker and skilled in many tasks, so his master allowed him to marry and have children.  But Robert wanted something more.

The Civil War came, and in 1963, the Union navy blockaded the port of Charleston. The slaves who worked on the ship The Plantation know that the white crew went ashore most nights for rowdy times in the taverns.  Under Roberrt’s leaderships, the black workers hatched a plot. One night, when the white crew members were ashore, the slave crew stowed themselves and their families on the ship and set sail toward the blockading Union ships. Roert knew all the passwords at checkpoints, and having reached close to the Union ships, the crew hauled down the confederate flag and hoisted a white flag of surrender.  Supposedly, his words to the commander of the US. Navy ship were, “Christmas present for Mr. Lincoln.”

The former slaves were welcomed into the Union navy.  Robert Smalls learned to read, write, and navigate.  After the war he returned to Beaufort and served in the state legislature and the U.S. Congress.  While a state legislator, he authored legislation requiring the state to provide free public education for all children, black or white. Even after the end of Reconstruction, he remained active in local politics until his death in 1913.  The main street in the town of Beaufort where he was born is now Robert Smalls Boulevard.

Black History Month

Black History Month succeeded Negro History Month which was established in 1926. Exhibits, readings, displays, and other events remind us of our “favorite” black leaders. Black history gets the shortest month of the year, so we need to celebrate fast. It is followed by Women’s History Month in March and Pride Moth in June, leaving the other nine moths to presumably celebrate Cis-gendered white male contributions to our history.

Although I was born in Connecticut, I have spent most of my adult life in my adopted state of South Carolina.  I teach a short course for the Osher Lifelong Learning Center called “South Carolinians Who Should Be Famous but Aren’t’.” One of my favorites is a black man named Robert Smalls. I learned this story from a colleague in the history department. j was teaching an interdisciplinary honors course on risk and asked Alan Schaffer to give two lectures on great risk takers in history. I don’t remember who the other hero was, but Robert Smalls was unforgettable.

Robert Smalls was born in Beaufort in 1839, the son of a house slave. He grew up with his master’s son as a playmate.  When the master died, Robert became the property of his childhood playmate. They moved to Charleston and Robert was rented out to work on ships.  He was a hard worker and skilled in many tasks, so his master allowed him to marry and have children.  But Robert wanted something more.

The Civil War came, and in 1963, the Union navy blockaded the port of Charleston. The slaves who worked on the ship The Plantation know that the white crew went ashore most nights for rowdy times in the taverns.  Under Roberrt’s leaderships, the black workers hatched a plot. One night, when the white crew members were ashore, the slave crew stowed themselves and their families on the ship and set sail toward the blockading Union ships. Roert knew all the passwords at checkpoints, and having reached close to the Union ships, the crew hauled down the confederate flag and hoisted a white flag of surrender.  Supposedly, his words to the commander of the US. Navy ship were, “Christmas present for Mr. Lincoln.”

The former slaves were welcomed into the Union navy.  Robert Smalls learned to read, write, and navigate.  After the war he returned to Beaufort and served in the state legislature and the U.S. Congress.  While a state legislator, he authored legislation requiring the state to provide free public education for all children, black or white. Even after the end of Reconstruction, he remained active in local politics until his death in 1913.  The main street in the town of Beaufort where he was born is now Robert Smalls Boulevard.

A Torrent of Holidays

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I always like to write about holidays. (A gentle reminder of my book Economics Takes a Holiday!) February began with Imbolc and Groundhog Day, pauses for Superbowl Sunday, then cruises on through Mardi Gras and Ash Wednesday, Valentine’s Day, and Presidents’ Day. Easter and President’s Day are moveable feasts, especially Easter This year Edster falls on April 5th, which moved Mardi Gras and Ash Wednesday back into mid-February. President’s Day always falls between the 15th and the 21st of February, whichever is a Monday. It is also not the ever the birthday of either of the two presidents it was created to honor, Washington and Lincoln.  Fortunately it is not leap year, or the 29th would be Sadie Hawkins Day. 

 This confluence of holidays calls for exceptionally rapid costume changes of emotional attitude. The Superbowl is just six days after groundhog Day and six days before Valentine’s day, eight days before Presidents’ Day, and nine days before Mardi Gras, followed immediately by Ash Wednesday and Lent. two days before Mardi gras, Valentine’s Day coincided with Ash Wednesday, and before we knew it,  Presidents Day. A quick change of pace from a fast-paced, loud, noisy football game watched by millions to a religious holiday marking a season of repentance and reflection interspersed with a celebration of romantic love and ending on a sharp reminder that we are in a very intense and perhaps even ominous election year. From crocuses to Dust Thou art and to dust you shall return to national politics is a lot for our shortest month.  And if you are Chines, you have a New Year’s Day in the mix!

 Unlike the Christmas holidays, each one of these holidays calls for a different kind of emotional response.  Valentine’s Day is lighthearted and sentimental, hearts and chocolate and cards, the only one that calls for spending money. Presidents’ Day is largely an excuse for a day off with banks and post offices closed and most places, no school. Mardi Gras is the final celebratory fling (the carnival, literally meaning farewell to meat) before Ash Wednesday. This holiday calls observant Christians to the austere penitential six weeks of Lent.  Even those of us whose faith traditions didn’t make a big deal out of Lent often feel compelled to join our high church comrades in giving something up for Lent.   Nothing like a holiday the celebrates self-denial. By March 1st, (Internatioanal Friendship Day, we will be in for a good rest with no significant holidays till Saint Patrick’s Day and Ostara, the pagan name for the vernal lequinox.

All these holidays have a common element, however, and that element is hope.  Valentine’s Day was originally a Roman holiday. The name of the month, February, refers to the fever of love. The earth is preparing to be fertile and humans are willing to go along with it by celebrating romantic love, even if it is only by watching the latest season of Bridgerton on Netflix. Renewal of plant and animal life as we all start to emerge from winter’s hibernation is a source of hope.  As the weather warms, we can spend more time outdoors—walking, gardening, coffee on the patio. SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder) is banished until November. 

Elections sometimes run on hope, sometimes on fear, most often (this year included) on a mixture of the two.  In a polarized nation, both the hopes and the fears are more intense. Theologian Joanna Macy reminds us that hope is useless unless it is active hope, a spur to invest our efforts in seeking out those candidates who best embody our vision of how our state, local, and federal governments should carry out that visionary hope. We can also hope for the future of our planet by engaging in sustainable lifestyles and inquiring of candidates what they propose to do about growth management and air and water pollution and global warming.

Finally, Mardi Gras and Lent are about letting go, turning one’s back on self-indulgence after one last fling and instead making an effort to cultivate the spirit. (In medieval times, it was also a way to stretch the food supply in the final months before spring crops began to come in.) It is long enough to change, short enough to see the light of Easter at the end of the Lenten tunnel. Just a manageable chunk of time to sustain the hope that by Easter, the holiday of renewal and rebirth, we will be reborn as better, wiser, more patient and less greedy and gluttonous than we were six weeks ago.  That’s a tall order, but we have to start somewhere.

AS we zip through these back-to-back holidays, let us celebrate hope.  Especially the hope that we have transformed into the practice of active hopefulness as we work toward bringing our hopes to fruition. In summer, this season of hope is followed by the season of joy, in autumn the season of wisdom, and in winter a season of rest and recovery. May the hopeful and challenging rhythms of the earth resonate in your body, mind, and soul this spring holiday season.

Groundhog Day 2026

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This is my annual updated version a holiday variously known as the feast of Saint Bridget, Imbolc, Oimelc (both Celtic words related to lambing), and Groundhog Day.  I mentioned that the first of February was the only holiday devoted to housecleaning in an email to my daughter. Aha, she said that explains the backstory for the movie Groundhog Day.  It’s like house cleaning. You clean, it gets dirty, you clean it again, it gets dirty again… A good story line for a movie! At least my repetition, unlike the movie, is only once a year.

Imbolc, Oimelc, or Groundhog Day, all anticipate spring. It is one of the lesser-known cross-quarter holidays on the Wheel of the Year. In addition to Groundhog Day, it survived as the feast of the purification of the virgin (Mary) after the birth of her son 40 days earlier. It is also the day devoted to Saint  Bridget or Brigid. Bridget is the Celtic Triune Goddess in her maiden phase, converted to a Christian saint. The corn maiden from the previous harvest is brought out in her honor as a virgin once again, ready to encounter the Sun King reborn at Yul in a mating ritual of spring.

The purification part of this holiday was known in pre-feminist times as spring house cleaning. In ancient time among the Celts, Imbolc cleaning consisted of removing the Yule greenery from the home and burning it, cleaning up fields and home, and in Ireland, burning old Bridget wheels and making new ones. By Imbolc, most of us have taken down the tree and put away the decorations from Christmas, but if you haven’t, you can use Imbolc as the excuse for delaying it till now.  After Imbolc, you are at risk of being labeled a lazy pagan if you don’t deal of the winter holiday residue.

Imbolc is approaching the end of an indoor time. It’s cold and still pretty dark, but it is the waxing period of light and warmth following the winter solstice. It represents a final stage of wintry inwardness before the crocuses and daffodils invite us to look outward again. But as I write this onjanuary31s, I am looking out at heavy snow, cancellations of all activities for three days, record low temperatures.  What will Punxsutawney Phil think when he pokes his head out in the snow I Pennsylvania this year?and Housebound, we must find our spiritual practice within that space. It is the late stage of the hibernating season as we prepare for the cycle of life to begin again.

Spiritual practice has enjoyed something of a resurgence in recent decades.  A spiritual practice is anything that is centering, mindful, focusing, and connects you to the sacred in a very inclusive sense.  Practicing patience with difficult people is a spiritual practice.  Listening attentively is a spiritual practice.  Eing mindfully is a spiritual practice. Meditation and prayer are traditional spiritual practices in many religions.  But there is also a form of spiritual practice that invests the ordinary activities of daily life with significance by the spirit in which ww carry them out.

The essence of spring housecleaning as spiritual practice blends several Christian and Buddhist ideas.  One is humility; no task is too menial that we are above it, as in Jesus washing his disciples’ feet. The second is mindfulness, to be engaged in the moment, to calm the monkey mind, to focus all our attention on the window being washed or the floor being swept. The third is letting go of attachment to possessions as an encumbrance on our spiritual life, passing them on to another use or another user. The spiritual practice of spring housecleaning can incorporate all three.

Housecleaning means two different things.  One is the emphasis on clean, as in wash windows, polish furniture, remove cobwebs, paint, scrub floors, clean woodwork, dust the books. That’s both the humble and the mindful part.  In the words of one contemporary Buddhist writer, “after enlightenment, the laundry.” The other kind of housecleaning is to declutter, simplify, recycle, let go of possessions no longer needed, like the greens from Yul in the Celtic tradition.  That’s the letting go part. 

For many years my Lenten practice, for the forty days that begin sometime after Imbolc and stretch to the floating holiday of Easter, was to wash a window every day.  Then I moved to a smaller house, which taxed my ingenuity to find forty windows.  I included car windows, TV and computer screens, mirrors.  Friends helpfully offered their windows, but I did not wish to discourage their own spiritual practice.   There is something very satisfying, very symbolic in letting the light of the returning spring shine through a clean window, but it means more when it’s my window. 

A friend described a similar cleaning ritual, only she does it all on New Year’s Day.  She takes each of her many books down one at a time off the shelf, dusts it (and the shelf), and decides whether it stays or goes.  If books are a rich and meaningful part of your life, revisiting these old friends and deciding what role they still may play in your life and which ones should be shared with others is definitely a spiritual practice.  This particular ritual embodies both humility (dusting). mindfulness (concentrated attention on the books and the memories and teachings they hold) and letting go (books to be passed on). This year, I enlisted my granddaughter and her boyfriend, both book lovers, to help me to choose which ones they wanted and cart the rest to a newly discovered (to me) used bookshop in Anderson.

So, as the daffodils and crocuses pop their leaves through the snowy ground, as the groundhog in Punxatawny ponders his forecast, we can prepare to emerge from the hibernating season by renewing the spaces we inhabit. Like the bluebirds, whose house I just recently cleaned for their new nesting season  (hey refuse to return to a dirty nest), let us be about the humble tasks of maintaining our habitats. Spring housecleaning only comes once a year!

This is my annual update of this minor holiday. Enjoy!

Please share my blogs with others who may find them interesting.  Also be sure to read my 2023 book, Passionately Moderate: Civic Virtues and Democracy. Available in paperback and Kindle editions from amazon.

Winter Haiku

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As you-all know haiku is a Japanese poetic form. They are m ore loose with the number of    lines and numbers of syllables, but we Anglos seem to have adopted  a structured form of three lines of 5, 7, and 5 syllables. I like the discipline; I find it easier to be creative sometimes when the picture you are painting is bounded by a frame!

So here are three winter haiku as I reflect on my experience of my 85th winter.

Winter’s cold dark days

Turn souls inward, watching

For the groundhog’s sign.

Winter’s main task is not

To wait, but to spend this time

Being and becoming.

Under the snow lie bulbs

Spreading their deep roots below

Prepared to blossom forth.

Got a haiku you can share/ Send them to me.

Creative Resistance

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Before you begin, recite this mantra, alone or among allies. The mantra is this.

I am not alone. I am not powerless.

You are not alone. You are not powerless.

Together, let us find and use our power.

The first step is to find your people.  The ones who care about democracy, and freedom, and equality, and compassion, and justice. They may be family, friends, colleagues, members of a church or civic organization. They may be people you have known a log tie or people who just met.

What kind of power do we have against a fascist government and thugs in the street? We have the power of witness to testify, in person and among others and with videotapes, to what is happening, and to insist on following the law, of all of it. The first amendment. The second amendment. The Fourth Amendment. The tenth amendment. Freedom of speech and assembly. The right to carry a legal, registered gun in accordance with the laws of the state. The right to be safe in your homes and cars from being attacked by thugs masquerading as law enforcement. The right of states to try crimes committed in their jurisdiction.

So you didn’t go to Minneapolis Neither did I. What power do we have? We can protest where we are, loudly and visibly and in numbers too big to ignore (Thanks, “I am woman.”. ) We can send money to good candidates and volunteer to help in campaigns, which are coming at us already in special elections and primaries. We can annoy our representatives in Washington by demanding that the executive branch stop ignoring the law and the courts, and demand that the legislative branch resume its neglected duties of oversight. with our concerns about honesty, transparency, and accountability.

Some of these political actors can be swayed by moral and legal arguments, or threats of retribution in elections and in court, Those approaches are good things to do, especially as part of a group. Support organizations like the ACLU. Join Indivisible. Read Heather Cox Richardson. Listen to Rachel Maddow. And talk to your friends, neighbors, family, anyone who will listen.

 But as an economist, I also like to use the weapons of the marketplace to communicate with the worst corporate offenders that are enabling this destructive behavior. If you own their stock, sell it, or participate in shareholder complaints.  You have the right to show up at corporate meetings or author resolutions and get other stockholders to join.  If you are part of a religious community ask if your faith tradition is a member of the Interfaith Center for Corporate Social Responsibility.  Invest in good companies that don’t kiss the ring but instead try to be responsive to all their stakeholders—customers, suppliers, employees, communities and yes, shareholders. Invest in socially responsibly companies or in mutual funds that have criteria that expect their stocks reflect good corporate citizenship.

  If you buy their products, stop! And tell them why and tell your friends. And write a letter to the CEO of the company to tell him what you are doing.  My letter is addressed to Andrew R. Jassey, CEO, Amazon, 550  Terry Avenue N, Seattle, WA 98019.

My economic power is small, as is yours, but together, we can change the world.  As economist Eugene Steuerle reminds us, we get the government we deserve.  Let’s earn ourselves a better government. However long it takes, the time to start is now.

Cocooning with Books

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I am an avid and voracious reader, usually about 100 books a year.  I especially enjoy reading when the weather outside is not especially pleasant and the days are short.  I thought I might share with my followers some of the best books I read in 2025.

My tastes are fairly eclectic—biography, history, historical fiction, philosophy, politics, behavioral economics, theology.  My two favorite series in historical fiction are Peter Tremayne’s Sister Fidelma mysteries, set in 7th century Ireland and a very comfortable way of learning about the history  and culture of the Irish,  I share that Celtic heritage on my mother’s side, more Scottish than Irish with a dollop of Welsh and some stray Gauls and Franks on my father’s side.  To balance Fidelma and affirm my primary Celtic heritage from Scotland (my mother was a Stewart), I also read How the Scots Invented Modern Civilization.  Although I am not overly fond of the ancient Romans, as the sworn enemies of my Celtic ancestors, I did enjoy the five (bad) emperor series of biographical fiction by Simon Turney.

In philosophy, I am especially partial to the writings of a rather obscure British ethicist, Mary Midgeley, who with three other women philosophers challenged the reigning and rather sterile orthodoxy in ethics in mid20th century England. I discovered Midgeley and the other three in a book called The Women Were Up to Something.

For the place where ethics meet politics, I am a fan of Buddhist theologian and social activist Joanna Macy’s Active Hope.  The most famous works on behavioral economics were by Daniel Ariely and Daniel Kahnemann but the award for best explanation by a non-economists the recounting of Kahnemann and Tversky’s work by Michael Lewis, the Undoing Project. Michael Lewis is more famous for his books about finance (The Big Short, is my favorite). but this one was also a delightful read.

Among novels, two books stood ut: Percival Everett’s James, a retelling of the story of the escaped slave in Twain’s classic Huckleberry Finn, told from Jim’s perspective. Also, Ariel Lawson’s Frozen River, the story of a midwife in 18th century Maine based on her journals.

I hope one of those suggestions from my 2025 reading might appeal to you, and I invite my blog followers to send me their favorite books they read in 2025, because I am always seeking suggestions.  Books are better enjoyed when they are shared! I hope to make this an annual event for as long as I can see to read, and after that, audiobooks!

Welcome to Carnivale

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In the Christian tradition, the Christmas season ends on January 6th with the arrival of the three kings or wise men bringing gifts to the infant Jesus.Since every season had to have a name, the period from Epiphany to the start of Lent, was simply called Epiphany. Its length varies, depending on the date of Easter, which moves around. But in certain parts of the world with a Hispanic or French heritage, many of them in Latin America, this same season has a Latin name, Carnivale. In Latin, it means farewell (vale) to meat.(carne).. But not yet! It’s more like one long Mardi Gras, the day before Lent begins, which in Frenchmeans Fat Tuesday. Mardigraas is followed by the lean and somber 40 days of Lent. The food stores put away for the winter months are disappearing,and this is one last party. .It is perhaps significant that Carnivale is more widely celebrated in the Southern hemisphere where the summer with its abundant harvest and long days is moving toward autumn even as we in the Northern hemisphere are seeing winter ever so slowly inching toward spring.. Virtue does not require the absence of meat, but rather a focus on only greater moderation. Mderation in all things is a much more challenging virtue to cultivate.. Somehow it seems easier to say “none” than to say “less,” but the middle course is more sustainable.

My oldest daughter is a vegetarian, or at least a pesce-vegetarian, meaning that she does eat fish. An d definitely not a vegan, because she is quite willing to eat eggs and milk and butter. But for those of us accustomed to a main course of some animal variety, it seems like a big sacrifice. To reverse the Bible maxim, the spirit may be willing but the flesh is weak! Like Saint Augustine, who famously prayed “Lord make me chaste, but not yet,” we are willing to commit our future selves to good behavior–but not yet.

I am back on my nonbinary crusade. Why does it have to be either -or rather than both-and? We know that too much rich food, including meats, is not healthy for our bodies or for the planet. We grow a lot of grains to feed animals so that we can eat the animals,when it would cause much less erosion, drought, and climate change if we bypassed the cow or pig and just ate the grains. Our Asian siblings do not make meat the center of every meal, relying more on fruits and vegetables and cereal grains.. .

Each new day is a new opportunity to recall those commitments of our future selves, whether it is to eating habits that are better for ourselves, our fellow humans and our one and only planet, or to other ways in which small but significant ways in which we spent our time, our money, our attention and our efforts.

It is January. It is cold. Days are short. Nights are long and dark. Our New Year’s resolutions are a whole ten days behind us. It is easy to comfort ourselves with rich food and cocooning before a warm fireplace and a warm TV, and more difficult than at other times of year for us to stay focused on the person we want, intend,aspire to be. or to become. But every day is the start of a new year. in which to experience the joy of Carnivale, the warmth of family and friends and simple pleasures and simple foods, boasrd games and dancing instead of steak and ale, football and social media, or other indulgences that often accompany Carnivale. Life takes place one day at a time., What one change can you commit to today as a start toward a new season, a new way of being and doing?

The Role and the Rule: Black Friday

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One of the insights I gained from studying Stoic philosophy, is that the different roles we play call for different virtues or rules to guide our behavior.  The virtues required of a student are different from those of a banker or a teacher. As a grandmother I know well how different my responsibilities are toward my grandchildren than their parents’ obligations.

Each of us plays multiple roles in the course of each day.  I may be called to act in my capacity as economist, writer, neighbor, friend, matriarch (mother/grandmother), social activist, or member of an organization.  This idea may devolve into a long series of blogs, but I thought I would begin wit one of the four roles that we identify in economics: a consumer, a worker, an owner, and a citizen. With Black Friday, the peak consumption holiday of the year, about to descend on us on Friday, consumer is where I will start.

You might not think of connecting virtue to buying goods and services, but in fact there are several virtues that come into play.  Among the classic Aristotelian virtues, virtuous consumption calls for prudence (practical wisdom) and temperance, or moderation.

But consumption is not just about “me.” Our purchases and use of goods and services has an impact on other people. The waste we produce fills our landfills and requires scarce and valuable resources. The buildings we build reduce the number of trees and their important functions of shade and carbon absorption. The cars we buy and drive affect air quality. The pesticides we use on our lawns and gardens reduce the population of insects and birds.

And it isn’t just about what we buy, it is also whom we buy it from.  Does this seller treat its suppliers and workers well and respect the environment? Will shopping online over time reduce access to local businesses that help communities thrive? Can we convert some of our gift giving to experiences rather than material objects (theater tickets are one of my favorites).

All the effects of our spending on other people and on communities and even the earth are what economists call externalities. .  An externality is a negative or positive consequence, usually unintended, on other people and places.created by how you spend your money. Prudence, or practical wisdom, calls us to be mindful of how our “votes” in the marketplace doing our holiday shopping impact of friends, neighbors, and fellow citizens. Temperance calls us to control our appetites for material goods, not only because it is good for the soul but also because it keeps prices down for other buyers and enables them to stretch their dollars farther.

Another virtue that comes into play in spending our money is gratitude and its expression in action as generosity. There are a lot of calls for generosity this time of year—making sure that poor children get holiday cheer, that no one goes hungry or lacks heat or other necessities. The Salvation Army bell ringer is there to remind us. Our shopping is often motivated by a desire to be generous toward our loves ones, but it can also incorporate a wider circle of caring.

Virtue ethics. Try it, you’ll like it.  You will come home from the mall with a warm sense of making loved ones happy while also conferring benefits on other anonymous, often invisible winners that are blessed by your practice of prudence, temperance and generosity in your holiday spending.

Repurposing Leftovers

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Leftovers take many forms, even if the ones we will be most mindful pf this week is leftover food from Thursday’s Thanksgiving meal. Tangible leftovers invite both creative re-use and letting go.  

In my growing up home, there were no food leftovers at home except for Thanksgiving turkey and Christmas ham. My mother always calculated how much she needed to feed three women of normal appetites and one son growing to six feet five, and it was all eaten. In my family with a husband and three daughters, none of us big eaters, there were always creative ways to incorporate leftovers into soups and casseroles and sandwiches.

However, there were fabric leftovers in my birth family, because my mother made our pajamas, shirts, blouses, dresses, skirts, and even tailored jackets.  Later, she coached me and my sister when we made our wedding gowns and bridesmaids’ dresses. At age seven I learned to use scraps for doll clothes, then was gently guided into making my own clothes.  My mother used scraps for potholders and quilts, and had a fierce competition with my mother-in-law in outfitting my daughters’ Barbie dolls. When the scraps got too small or too scrappy, there were always cleaning rags. I have no recollection of paper towels in my mother’s household.

Leftover fabric can make something beautiful or useful or both.  I have done a lot of quilting, table runners and potholders and occasionally actual quilts, mostly from leftover fabrics. In fact, the origin of quilting as an art form was to make good use of leftover fabric scraps. When I retired from sewing, except for mending, altering, and making gift bags, I gave my fabric stash to a friend of my granddaughter who was in college majoring in costume design.

Twelve years ago, I learned about another kind of leftovers that can be recombined in a different kind of quilt, with spare parts carefully recycled in other ways. Many of us are awash in household possessions—furniture, decorations, closets filled with clothes that no longer fit or that we just don’t wear, cupboards full of extra dishes and cooking gadgets, and for me, books.  Sometimes the answer to abundance run amok is a bigger house with more closets and bookshelves.  But as we get older, a better answer is often a smaller house with fewer possessions to look after, which invites creative use of the leftovers. This retreat from “hoyuseholding” is a useful lesson from Hinduism, which is very attuned to the different challenges and expectations at different stages of life. Old age is the time to let go of possessions and responsibilities and concentrate on matters of the spirit. Less is more, but we don’t want to waste those possessions we are letting go.

My friend Fran and I taught a continuing education class and wrote a book together about downsizing and decluttering after 50.  She was a former Clemson Extension agent and a realtor, with lots of experience in decluttering houses about to be sold.  I knew more about writing than decluttering, but I learned a lot about decluttering when I left my big house where we lived for 46 years to move to a townhouse in a retirement community. The townhouse is furnished mostly with things that came from our big house, but I couldn’t begin to cram it all in.

If there are fifty ways to leave a lover,there are almost that many ways to dispose of National Geographics, porch furniture, tools, 33 RPM albums, carousels of slides, furniture, sailing trophies, all the leftovers of being married for 53 years to a loveable pack rat. The National Geographic magazines went to a home schooler I found on Freecycle. I gave Carl’s framing supplies to a young man whose mother was a fellow sailor of my husband and had taught junior sailing classes with him. I met people through freecycle who worked for Ulbrich Steel in Oconee County and wanted to know if we were related.  Yes, but not in regular contact, because Carl’s father was the black sheep of the family.  He had not only moved out of the home town of Wallingford, but had, horror of horrors, married a Protestant.

When Fran and I taught the decluttering and downsizing class, we found that people had the most trouble letting go of objects that were the carriers of memories, because they are afraid that the memories would disappear along with the objects that call those memories back into the present. Sometimes I chose to let thrift shops and recycling centers do the work for me, and trusted the universe to keep the memories. Other times, I knew where the right home was for a treasured item and was pleased to help it carry those memories to a good place.  I emailed my three daughters with pictures of Carl’s sailing trophies, all practical items destined to be used– etched glass salad bowls, mugs and pitchers. They opted to take most of them.  My middle daughter Carla claimed so many treasures to take back to New Jersey that we had to meet in Southern Virginia, to unpack my car and fill up hers with everything from 33 rpm records to end tables made by her father to snorkeling gear.  These were among the leftovers of a lifetime of memories, and a good way to let go. 

Some of our leftovers are the actual memories, of holidays, travel, milestones, joys and sorrows shared stored in the refrigerator of the mind and the cupboard of the heart. May your leftovers of all kinds find a good home in a hungry belly, a warm quilt, a different use, wherever or wherever they can still be useful and meaningful to someone. Let us also share our leftovers of mind and heart with one another, recalling the joy in the memories they embodied.