News Fast Day 3, and Growing

So, it's day 3 of the news fast and it's getting more difficult. I have plenty of time to think and write, which is great, but I also have a sense of being out of touch. I realized much of my knowing what's happening in friends' and family's lives depends on Facebook, rather than actual interaction.

I am also thinking a lot about being pregnant and becoming a parent in a city (and country) that's both expensive and very hardworking. The responsbility of doing things right-- planning right, eating right, exercising right, working right, sleeping right, avoiding stress-- can be overwhelming in a society that prides itself in having options (and perhaps any society). I've realized it's not a burden that's worth carrying, but it's also a burden that's hard to let go of!

In the midst of a lot of choices, my hope is that we can live below our means in the smallest place we can handle, continue to live without a car; and try to expose Little Blob to everything that's awesome about Boston- the beautiful gardens, great summer feel, the diversity, our church, friends, and being nearby Eug's family.

Day 1 and 2 of News Fast

Jo Hunter Adams

I've been learning about different kinds of fasting recently, and given my pregnancy I didn't want to fast from food. At the same time, I've been thinking about my news addiction (is that too strong a word?) and it felt like it was the thing I could release myself from for the next thirty days.

The fast includes all news websites, my Google Reader, as well as Facebook.

Reading news tends to be a means for me to avoid something, particularly work. It takes a lot of my time and I tend to talk and think a lot about it. I'm excited to step back and figure out what is useful and helpful in my life and what isn't.

In "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle" Barbara Kingsolver wrote about how we tend to live vicariously and be affected by news that actually need not affect us. I'm sympathetic to this view. It's tremendously hard to focus on the present, and be present to whatever is happening in the room that you're in at that moment.

I've tended to believe that being informed, understanding current events and reading good news sources are all very important for me to be able to live a socially responsible life. Yet when I take stock, many of my more deeply held views on socially responsibility and current events come from books written well after the fact, rather than daily news sources. I'm not exactly sure at what point observing life and actually living it come in conflict with one another. I certainly want to understand issues where I can add my voice or respond in some way (even if the response is just on this blog). But I also what to be fully engaged in the relationships and interactions I am in the midst of.

So here's to the next 29 days! I'll let you know how it goes.

A Not so Tiny House

Earlier in 2009 I wrote about our dream of having our very own tiny house. Part of our dream was about much more than the house itself (though tiny houses are supercool): it was a desire for a home, for the benefits of simplicity, for monthly bills that we could handle.
In December we found ourselves with all those desires fulfilled, although fulfilled with a sense of "now and not quite yet."

We didn't arrive in South Africa with the intention of buying a house, although we hoped to learn what we could to prepare to do that in the future. But we found ourselves in Observatory and fell in love with it. It's very close to the center of Cape Town, has a university feel, and is generally exactly what Eug and I like.

Miraculously, among the few houses we saw in Observatory, one was within our price range. It's a two bedroom semi-detached house we really loved, and were able to make an offer and sign on the day we left South Africa (see the white house on the right). We'll be renting it out in the short term, but it seems like a huge step towards our vision and hope for our future.