Why I am an Idealist

I’m a 31-year-old Jewish wife and mother of three.  I’ve reached this awkward plateau in life between mountains of idealistic youth-filled dreams and valleys of middle-age unavoidables.  Having a family to raise, means I can’t hop on a plane and go wwoofing around the world. (Wwoofing means traveling around the world volunteering on organic farms, in exchange for room and board.  It stands for World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms.)  But I also haven’t settled into my life in a way that I can say, “Yeah, I could do this every day for the next 20 years.” 

In conversations with the baby boomers, I often hear the words, “You’re an idealist.  And that’s great, because you’re young.  But when you get to be my age…”  And I can’t help but think, I never want to get to a point in my life when I stop being an idealist. 

I wasn’t around in the 60’s, looks like it was a lot of fun though.  But from what I can gather, a larger than average generation all hit their rebellious teenage years at just the right moment in history when there was a cause to actually rebel against: Distrustful government, unwanted (and largely unexplained) wars, racial discrimination that was seen for what it was—ignorance.  They had the energy, youth, idealism and freedom, en masse, to be heard.  And things changed. 

But then came the 70’s, 80’s, 90’s… The economy went up, up, up into this seemingly endless bright future of comfort.  Jobs were plentiful and you could actually buy a home, pay the mortgage AND put money away for a rainy day.  So the new feeling seemed to be, ‘Things are good, why rock the boat?’

 I was born in ’82, so my perspective is a little different.  I was born into a world where I was promised, if you get a good education, find a job you like, start a family and play your cards right, you too will find happiness and contentment with the way things are.  Sure, the government will disappoint you sometimes, life won’t be the adventure you dreamed up in your youth, but that’s ok, because you’ll come to appreciate your comforts too. 

Well, we all know now that that is a load of BS.  Wages are barely enough to cover expenses, if you can find a job at all. Saving is out of the question.  Social security and retirement are dinosaurs of the past, and the government is a bought and paid for institution that we can no longer rely on to have our best interests at heart. 

So do I move on into maturity and accept the current state of affairs as the way things are?  Or forever be labeled a naïve idealist and refuse to join the rat race? 

I guess the real question is: If life is not working this way, aren’t we obligated to try something else?  This is not the world I want to hand to my children.  I am unsatisfied with our education system, so I homeschool.  I am unsatisfied with our healthcare system, so I’ve tried to start a homestead farm where I can provide my family with organic food and fresh air.  I’m unsatisfied with the job market so I’ve tried to be self-employed.

Is it working?  Not really.  Does that mean that I should give up and join the masses?  No.  Because that way isn’t working either.  I choose to continue to envision a different, better future. And I will continue to take chances and even fail sometimes, in order to keep my dreams alive.  Because more than a white picket fence, ballet lessons and a car with a DVD player, I want to give my kids hope.  So that when they are in their thirties and they turn to me for advice I can tell them, “Never settle for comfortable.  Go for your dreams, and give your children a world that is a little better than the world I tried to give you.”