Circling Back Around . . . to Hope

 Sometimes being a little behind the times brings a helpful perspective.

The inside flap of my copy of The Audacity of Hope states this about its author: "Barack Obama is the junior U.S. senator from Illinois . . ." Published in 2006, this book served as Obama's political manifesto, the document that launched him into the graces of the Democratic literati and therefore into the White House. In hindsight, of course, it is easy to see with 20/20 vision the roots of Obama's work as president--the promises and designs that got him elected and the decisions that caused such disagreement with the Republicans during his two terms.

But the book provides so much more than a political platform. With witty and revealing personal narrative, Obama connects both the universal and unique aspects of human experience with a calling to public political service. With honesty and wisdom he reveals both why the work of politics is so hard and why it is necessary for the thriving of a nation.

I appreciate especially Obama's penchant for a diachronic approach: He delves into specific political issues that face us in the present and digs back in time to assess the historical roots of those issues. The Audacity of Hope clarifies the author's position on a host of issues facing the United States (in 2006, but also strangely still today), but also gives readers a series of instructive history lessons about the sources of those issues and the disagreements that plagued them from the beginning. We remember, with Obama's encouragement, that the United States has always been a place of public disagreement and political tension.

Though unabashedly Democratic in terms of its political leanings, the book does not condemn the opponents of the Democratic party. Obama, in the lines and between the lines, makes it clear that he respects the positions his opponents may take, even when he disagrees with them. Audacity thus serves as both a textbook on political theory and an example of civility in political discourse. I found myself thinking as I read it that it would serve well as a textbook for high school U.S. government courses.

I consider it providential that Audacity came into my hands as a gift just at this moment, as the 45th president disappears from a term wracked by extremes, incivility, and bitterness and the 46th president (as if simply stepping from vice-presidency to presidency) attempts to lead the country with calm, civility, and a gentleness that some have bewailed as boring. No doubt Democrats and Republicans will continue to disagree on--well, perhaps most things. One's foundational assumptions about the role of government, politicians, and individuals force mutually exclusive choices that only seem to be weakened by compromise. Therefore strength as commonly conceived will continue to breed staunch and intransigent opposition in America's political bodies.

But maybe, just maybe, when we can be clear-eyed and articulate about the experiences and reasons why we hold our assumptions and come to our present conclusions, then we can actively seek to work with our colleagues from across every aisle in order to develop a more perfect union. This possibility--that underneath our most foundational assumptions about politics lie even more basic assumptions about goodness and love--might be what resonated most in me as I read Obama's book. That in spite of disagreement we might still be able to uphold the good together I will continue to be audacious enough to hope.

~ emrys

What Could We Have Done?

The pandemic has wrought havoc on small businesses across the United States (and, I assume, all around the world). Some businesses, like the outdoor equipment suppliers we have in our town, have made record sales since everyone started trying to get out and away from other humans. Others, such as the businesses that focus on bringing people together--to eat, work out, or socialize--have been struck with huge deficits.

As I listen to the stories of struggling business owners and operators I hear the pain and suffering that results from having to cut payroll, take on debt, and wonder how to plan for every next month with all of its uncertainty. I am an operator of a very small business myself, and we have experienced the pain of covid's economic impact.

At the conclusion of a good commiserating session, when we're about to shrug and get on with our days, several times now I have heard the question, "But what could we have done?" It's rhetorical. The implication is that there is nothing anyone could have done. The appearance of a fast-spreading disease requiring people to stay out of each other's air space brings an inevitability of damage. No, there's nothing we could have done about the slowing of all things in-person.

But from a business perspective, and from a personal perspective, I don't want to give up on that question so fast. What could we have done?

Businesses define life and death financially. If there's enough money, the business carries on. If there's not, it goes under. If the income stream dries up for a time--for 6 months, 12 months, maybe 18 months--then for a business to survive it needs to have cash reserves. If it's going to survive a covid drought of customers, then it's going to need savings.

It occurs to me then that "What could we have done?" is answered by "Save." We could have saved money. We could have operated within a business model that assumes there is a chance, no matter how small, that at some point we'll be crippled for a year or more. So we save up a year's worth of payroll, of electric bills, of essential supplies so that even if the customers aren't coming in right now we can keep telling the world, "We're open and ready when you are!"

Saving is hard. Look at the miserable statistics of Americans' saving habits and see that we're not very good at it. Certainly not good enough that most of us would feel stable if we suddenly fell out of work for a year or more. But life and economics are such complex animals that we ought to assume that we'll suddenly have a break in our income at some point. So saving makes sense.

It's just as hard for small businesses, I think. So much of business is running to catch up with the mercurial interests of a market that always wants something newer, faster, shinier. Every penny must be spent, or else tomorrow's client may not come in through the door. But to be on the edge of bankruptcy all the time makes something like a pandemic fatal. Market anxiety cannot choke out the mandate to save.

We had a surge of interest on our staff last year in the Dave Ramsey phenomenon. What a cool thing: having a group of college students thinking about how to lower their debt, save money, and be in a stronger financial position for the long haul. It takes discipline, and saying "No" to a lot of spending. It sometimes requires feeling like the spendthrift world is passing you by, macchiato in hand, while you're stuck at home drinking drip coffee. It means deferring that dopamine hit of shopping and spending until the frontal lobe says it's wise. It's hard work.

But it makes the difference between riding the tide of a pandemic with a little tighter belt and going under. "What could we have done?" We could have saved money. We could have held back our insatiable desire for cheap and numerous goods in preparation for a couple of lean years. We could have planned for this.

Will we plan for the next one?

~emrys

Passing Thoughts

I just finished reading a translation of Aulus Gellius' Attic Nights, a sort of journal compiled by a member of the upper-class Greco-Roman literati. His reflections span a wide field of philosophical inquiries, grammatical inquisitions, legal observations, and social and cultural critiques. Reading it gives a disjointed, snapshot view of life in the Mediterranean in the second century AD--sometimes affording tantalizing one-offs regarding the values undergirding that society.

Since my level of historical knowledge about that provenance is limited, the thin slices of detail about Gellius' world serve mostly to inspire reflection on our own time. In one brief passage, Gellius records the name of the "first Roman ever to secure a divorce" from his wife, on the grounds that she could not have children. In order to secure said divorce, apparently he had to cite the fact that upon his marriage to her he had sworn an oath that the purpose of the marriage was to have children. What a strange thing--to me, of course--to bind and delimit a marriage by oath to having children.

At that time, as in too many others, women were legal property of their husbands, so I suppose it would be the equivalent of winning a civil suit for the price paid for a "lemon" vehicle. I bought the car not because I wanted the vehicle itself per se, but because I needed it for transportation. Therefore if it does not run (or breaks down to often) it is not fulfilling its function and therefore the transaction can be nullified.

I wonder if this is why a commonplace set of vows has husband and wife declare "for richer and poorer, in sickness and in health"? Perhaps husbands had taken to divorcing wives because they were not successful entrepreneurs for the household or because they took ill and did not fully recover? Thus the vow at the altar had to ensure (for the wife and her family) that the husband would not see those "failures" as breach of contract.

Gellius also records that a Roman of high political office ("censor") was disciplined by the senate for owning an excessive amount of silver tableware. This excess signified too much luxury for said political position. The event seems even stranger to me given that Roman culture was not renowned for its austerity or elective poverty and simplicity.

How would politics change if "excessive luxury" were considered a punishable offence for public servants and elected officials? The cynical part of me thinks that the luxury would simply go underground. And it begs the question: Who determines what is too luxurious? I suppose that determination would have the usual legal channels, like any other law. An interesting idea nonetheless, that at some level a republic would officially declare a limit on the wealth owned or displayed by its ruling members.

Don't pick up Attic Nights unless you're ready to skim over large bits about Latin and Greek grammar. Gellius was very concerned with esoteric questions of language, translation, and poetic usage. (This is why I enjoyed the book so much, I think!) Even passing over some of those, I appreciated the little oddities of ancient life. In the midst of the oddities, however, one will be rewarded with edifying meditations such as whether virtuous life necessarily brings happiness. Does it?

A dear friend once remarked that the famous ancient and Medieval authors "never had to wash their own socks." An overarching theme that surfaced for me was how much time Gellius had to walk around Rome and Athens, going to dinner parties, chatting with people in high office and station. He tries to put a great deal of weight on these matters of speech, writing, and society; but his are--to use a contemporary turn of phrase--first-world problems (wealthy problems). Gellius makes no reference to work or managing patron-client relationships in order to stay afloat. He is upper-class, it seems, and the life that allows literacy and time for ruminating on philosophical squabbles belongs perhaps entirely to the rich. It might be the same in every generation, though I hope that in the present-day United States we have come somewhat closer to allowing anyone in any stratum of society access to learning and discourse like Gellius'.

Maybe I can be an agent to extend the reach of that learning to another generation, whether of humble or luxurious means. I hope that perhaps the good work I do and the conversations I have are not limited to the ivory halls and wealthy dinner parties, but include anyone who wants to consider the deeper questions of life.

~ emrys