Capital gains

The past month has passed in a whirlwind of daily grind, clicking wrists, shoulder ache, trousers that cut in when I sit down, and a week long hiatus of eating and drinking more than’s good for me, sandwiched between mountains of washing. There’s no sense complaining – the pictures on Facebook make it all look idyllic, but by god, it’s hard work. But then keeping busy is good for the body (or, so says the NHS back pain ‘fit for work’ page), and soul, what’s left of mine, now I’ve sold it to the corporate rat race.

And it’s about to get busier – nervous breakdown season is nigh upon us – otherwise known as December – where we all try and shovel in a month of enforced jollity, all the while fighting misery weather, tightened deadlines and an expanding waistline, wrapped up in a shiny bow. It’s no wonder I’m ready to escape it all over again.

And an escape route I have finally, fingers crossed, achieved. This Saturday, Tom went to Devon for lunch – back to the village where we spent an idyllic half-term of windblown walks, toasty fires, rustic pubs, generous pasties and  oh-so-much friendlier locals, to look at a cottage that came up for sale almost the day we came home.

Having dropped the idea of buying a holiday home abroad in post-Brexit Britain, where your pound to euro ratio is anyone’s guess, we’ve decided to throw our lot in at the far south west and hope for the best.

We spent the last two days holding our breath, following Tom’s 500 mile round trip, our offer was accepted. And so begins yet another mountain climb as we hoik our mortgage back up to the hilt, and pray we can still afford furniture that’s more chic than shabby, so we can get our holiday let-come-second home up and running by spring, as we’ll need to to make the venture pay for itself. But in the future, I hope it’ll allow me to retire on more than the bare minimum to keep me alive, or worse, praying for death. 

The so-called free world might have lurched to the right overnight – I’m so jaded with political speculation already, I can’t even bear to talk about events elsewhere. But at least now I can wrap myself in my own bubble of middle-class privilege  and appreciate the gains of hard work and a boyant housing market that, incidentally, I got onto under my own steam, through the ‘priviledge’ that global capitalism has finally afforded me. I’m fairly sure global capitalism won’t much fund a good retirement any other way. 

So yes, I’m privileged, if that means getting what you strive for by whatever means necessary. I’m just doing what I need to because it’s the best thing I can do with what I’ve got. I’m lucky to be able to do it – so lucky that owning one house, yet alone two, feels greedy in a world of housing shortages. But then, noone gets anywhere in life by apologising – none of us can really help what we are and what we do: we’re all impelled by forces beyond our own hard work. Capital, after all trumps labour, every time. Which is perhaps why what’s happened today is not so surprising after all – we get the leaders we deserve and Trump knows better than any of us that in the game of life, the winner takes all. And in this capitalist nightmare we’ve created for ourselves, if we’re not winning, we’re losing. I just hope, whatever else happens, this means I’m on more of a winning streak for a while.