Choices we can afford

kw: fireworks, independence day, musings

Saturday, July 4, Independence Day 2009, was a (nearly) nonelectronic day for me. I work with computers, so spending time at home on the computer sometimes seems like the "busman's holiday". We slept in late, did some reading, scared up a little grub for a potluck lunch and went to see friends midday. These were church friends—a family whose house we hadn't visited before—and a number of other families came over, so we spent some time singing and talking before we ate. Then we talked some more, sang some more, and went home.

I napped, and I suppose my wife was either reading or watching TV. We stepped out at dusk to look at some of the illegal fireworks displays going on all around us, then watched "A Capitol Fourth" on PBS and turned in. Rather strange that this symbol of our freedom is restricted in so many states now.

I remember being asked, every year until 9th grade, to write something like "What Freedom Means to Me." At any age less than about forty, I don't think I ever had any idea. I sure am glad nobody preserved those meaningless essays! Even today, I reckon my ideas in that regard are repetitive and perhaps trite. I boil it all down to one word: Choices. In five words, "Am I free to choose?" In a few more words than that:

• I blog on Blogger. I don't have to; there are several free blogging services that work equally well. If I want to pay, there are several fee-based ones with features some writers desire. But, I am free to blog.
• Among all the social networking sites, I use only LinkedIn. I don't have time for Xanga, Facebook, or MySpace (though my son does), let alone Twitter, which I consider terminally inane. I have several cousins, all Mensa members, who must spend a third of their time Tweeting. But, they are free to tweet, or post on multitudes of Walls, as am I if I choose.
• Searching using Google, Yahoo, MSN, AltaVista, or Bing yields uncensored results. This is not so everywhere. At least here, search servers are free of censorship.
• The internet is not available everywhere. And it is quite costly in some places. Everywhere that advertisers are free to support it, the internet can be used at minimal cost. I use it heavily. My father almost not at all (just a little e-mail), but, we are free to do so.
• I met with the church today. It is a nice little congregation, meeting in a rented office space. Maybe some day we'll own a building. We don't have any secrets; we don't have to hide. We are free to meet together.
• My house is air-conditioned. I earn enough to keep it any temperature I want. Being a bit frugal, I keep the thermostat at 78° when I am home. My even more frugal wife sets it to 80°F when I am not home. Winters, we have a different set of negotiated temperatures. There was, at one time, a proposal to mandate by law the temperatures you could set. It was defeated, more than once. So far, we are free to set our thermostats, which have no recording or reporting devices attached.
• The cars we own were bought from a huge array of choices. We chose economical cars, but big enough to fit me comfortably. We weren't forced to choose American makes, and our cars are of mixed "ancestry" (designed overseas, built stateside). So, we were free to choose the most reliable brand.
• Don't get me started on food! We shop at least four supermarkets and a specialty store or two. Because we can. An elderly friend (now passed away) from China was visited by his sister after China eased visitation restrictions, some twenty years ago. They had not been able to meet for decades. She was full of propaganda, that she'd heard all her life, about how everything in China is better. One day he took her shopping. She stepped into the food store at the Produce end, looked around, and burst into tears. America is the best-fed nation on earth because farmers here are more free than anywhere else. Sadly I had to say "more free" because that freedom has been eroded for some fifty years, but it is still the best that exists.

That's enough. Point made.