I'll fill my walls now, not with what could be.
How my relationship with capital was informed by my home life. Detailing how it's changed over the years.
Last week I redecorated my apartment.
I mounted my old electric guitar, my bass, and hung a shelf. I know my neighbors hate it when I use my power drill, so I try my best to be respectful.
I should take a step back to make sure. One more time.
As I closed one eye and took a look at the wall, the shift in perspective prompted me to adjust where I would put the guitar mount. A little bit to the left.
The large gap in decor reminded me of my childhood; my developing years and all of those empty walls. All of the walls my mother refused to decorate because they weren’t fit enough. A symbol of our perpetual state of waiting, brought on by losing our childhood home.
The 10 years of empty Las Vegas apartments. The echoes of our laughter, of our cries, amplifying then lingering; with nothing to dampen the sound.
The empty walls eventually occupying more of my mind than that beautiful house my mom called our home.
“When I get a house as good as the one in Minnesota, I’ll decorate it. The apartment is just a step before I can settle. I promise.”
They’ve most likely removed the carpet. The wood on the deck has most likely rotted. I don’t think my dad built it right, I can’t remember. I’m not really sure how much of the memories I made in that house are accurate. If the pictures on Zillow reflect recent renovations, or if my undeveloped brain had filled the gaps in memory with what could be.
I do remember what my mom told me. I do remember what we strived for, what led us to those empty walls. I remember how she gave away everything we owned in a panic, how thought we’d be able to rebuild easily. I remember the years of realization, how long it took to see that we would never return to that lifestyle. We never got a real house.
She tried so hard to perfectly replicate our lives in a completely different setting. I wonder what spending years, essentially punishing yourself for your circumstance, does to you. I can only assume.
I wonder what it does to your children.
I know that I know that I don’t like any empty walls.
—
I joined my first social media platform, Facebook, at 8 years old.
I’m 24 now.
66.66% of my life where the internet has potentially—most definitely—perverted my thoughts. Where various social platforms informed my insecurities, morphed my desires.
I won’t give it too much credit, though. There has always been some degree of separation between the World Wide Web and I.
My Facebook account was made on the family computer. My dad had work to do, my sister had lyrics to learn and print out—someone always had to do something.
So in that time I would go touch grass.
Living in a state like Minnesota, it wasn’t really a punishment. There were ponds I could swim in, frogs I could catch. Why the hell would a 9 year old want to be on Facebook if they could go skateboard with the neighbors.
My Happy Pets could wait for me to get home.
It helped that my parents really didn’t care. We were free-range children. My dad was absent at best. My mom tried her best to make up for him, and keep us safe. Imagine how hard it is adjusting to life in a whole new country, now you want me to worry about a computer?
Can’t expect a woman to do it all on her own.
Besides, the lack of fear mongering about our computer meant there was nothing to trigger my demand avoidance. Therefore my actions were led by desire.
I wanted to be present, and to engage in life in fun and reckless ways. I wanted to go play outside. I think that’s human nature. I think that’s what we are programmed to want before money and social capital are brought into question.
Social media was like an occasional drunk cigarette. A compulsion based on boredom, based on proximity. I honestly continued to play outside much longer than all of my friends. 14-years-old still making “stew” with grass, setting pine needles on fire, riding around on a friend’s scooter. I enjoyed finding new ways to entertain myself.
But like a drunk cigarette, “on occasion” slowly became a part of my daily desires.
My friends started to believe they were getting too old for outside, so I needed to find a way to stay connected. I needed to fill my time.
Everyone had a phone— clearly I needed one.
I’d borrow my mom’s iPhone 4 to stay in the loop. Then I had a short stint with a Verizon tablet, a part of our service promotion. The iPad Air my dad gave my brother and I as a, “Please Convince Your Mom To Get Back With Me,” gift sometimes made its way to my backpack.
When I stopped spending time outside, when I stopped actually doing things is when I started to notice a shift in my values. All of the real threats to my comfort, like poverty, didn’t matter. I started to view peer validation and material goods as a cure-all for my new condition. A very made up condition.
I just didn’t have a cellphone. Not that big of a deal.
I wasn’t tangibly missing out on anything. I could use wifi or a friend’s phone to call. I had other electronics to keep up, but I felt behind. One more thing that would keep me separate from my peers.
My fixation would finally be remedied around my 8th grade graduation. To commemorate my years of straight-A’s, a distant family member offered me a prize of my choice. Disneyland, a laptop, money… I chose a rose gold iPhone 6s.
I can finally catch up with everyone!
What was the difference between it and my old family computer?
Not much.
I just thought that this would be more satisfying.
—
This phone remained my companion all through high school, through the beginning of college. It was comforting. Having something to call your own, something that grows with you. The dents and daily wear reminded me of my progress. Its slow depreciation instilling a sense of nostalgia for the passing time.
When I started gaining an audience on online people commented on my choice. A considerable number of my peers would joke about my busted phone. Was I broke? Was there something wrong with me?
To the broke question, yes.
But what is so wrong with keeping something that works?
The speculation was so confusing to me. People were expecting more, but why? I assume they wanted more wealth signifiers but I didn’t have them. That’s not what they followed me for.
At the time it bothered me, it made me doubt myself. It made me feel inadequate, and I internalized it. I let an old phone make me feel as if I wasn’t enough.
I was young.
I’m still young.
It wasn’t just the phone. It was the fact that my Vans were worn and dirty. My clothes were visibly poor quality. I spent years of my adolescence trying to cover up the fact that I was broke. I spent, and at times still spend so much time trying to prove to people that I’m valuable. I wanted people to think I was worth hanging out with.
Jokes about my phone persisted, but I kept her.
They still watched my glitchy, low resolution videos.
Eventually she died.
No one cared when I got a new phone.
Hm.
—
Our relationship to capital and wealth signifiers fluctuates based on who and what we surround ourselves with. It dictates whether or not we care about being present, or if we care about wanting more. Why do we always want more?
It’s a byproduct of capitalism. Wanting more makes sure we’re stuck in some sort of cycle. Stuck at a shitty job, so we can afford clothes we don’t even like. Stuck buying things that we’ll forget about when they’re not in our direct line of sight.
When you want more you don’t really have the chance to ask yourself how you feel. To realize how much the cycle deprives us of the things that make being alive so rewarding. It pains me to know how many years I have wasted self deprecating and devaluing my accomplishments. It pains me to see how much I have allowed others to remove the value of pleasure in my life. Most of my goals weren’t mine, and I only found that out by sitting with myself for a long time.
We feel alone in the cycle of “more” because it keeps you and those who surround you fully focused on the future so you don’t care about how you feel you don’t care about how poor your quality of life is now.
Fulfilling friendships and a nice summer picnic might be all you need to remember that life is good now. We have a choice in what we value. I try to value the feeling of being around the people who love me. I value the butterflies I get from learning something new. I value living.
My favorite jeans were second hand and smell like smoke. There’s a stain on the pocket but they fit me like a glove. They’re old. They were cheap. Tomorrow they might not fit me, and that will be tomorrow’s problem. Today I love my jeans. I don’t need any more jeans.
A job, a hobby, the cars, the phone, if we love it and it works that is enough.
I wish I could go back in time and decorate those empty walls.
I wish I could go back and tell my mom that her apartment could still be a home. That it didn’t matter how big people told her it needed to be.
For now, I’ll eyeball where to hang my old, cheap guitar. It'll sit next to the handmade wooden bass piece my friend made me. I like how they look next to each other. I can’t believe she put so much time into making it look like Marceline’s bass axe. I can’t believe how much she loves me. How much good exists when we don’t worry about what could be.