When I was a kid, life didn’t need a point. I snacked, I read, I made friends, I lived without worrying much about the future. I figured it would work itself out, and in the meantime, there were more pressing matters such as climbing trees and catching frogs.
In college it was similar, but with the singular addition of career choice. What do I want to be when I grow up? Pressing needs were course work and what kind of pizza to have for lunch, but otherwise I assumed that most of my future’s problems would solve themselves.
As an aside: I am so glad I now see career path as part of a life, not a defining characteristic.
When I discovered sex work in its various forms, my pressing needs became how to find work and stay safe. I searched for meaning in many places: the company of my colleagues, academic worlds full of mental health jargon, and affirming feedback from my clients. Now that I was in my future, my assumption that it would work itself out faced reality. To be honest, I got lucky and it mostly did, but having it “worked out” left me with a goal-shaped hole in my future.
I’ve written before about all my qualifications, and some lacks thereof. Each diploma, certification, mentoring session, and community gathering have all been to try to be meaningful. Constantly chasing someone else’s reassurances, so I can prove to the world that I matter. Manufacturing goal posts so I could feel like my days were in pursuit of something.
Cut to the lake.
I went kayaking on a windy morning. It was a bad day for it: the waves were up, clouds threatened rain, and it wasn’t very warm. But I like a challenge. I like bones in my meat, an ache in my muscles, and tricky word games… so I laughed when the threat came real, and I watched the birds wheel in the rain.
Getting out into nature when the weather sucks is the best. Other people stay inside; dry, warm, comfortable cowards,* while I share the world with the wilderness. I backed my kayak into a patch of lily pads, held fast against the waves, shipped my paddle… and watched for a while.
*To be fair: I have been that coward in a snuggly sweater and it is equally glorious.
Two Osprey circled above, waiting for their tasty fishy prey to make themselves known.
Dozens of Blue-Green Swallows flitted across the water, dipping and hovering, sometimes fighting the wind, then tilting and letting it carry them away.
A solitary waterbird, probably a loon, perched on the tip of a submerged log, wary even from a distance, and lumbered off before I could get a good look at it.
Canada geese, those ubiquitous water pests, kept coming and going with their obnoxious honks.
..
Sometimes you have to be still.
And there, quiet amid the chaos, I thought to myself: there it is. There is the meaning of life.
The meaning of life is to live it! To live it as best you can, to care for the people around you, to enjoy the moment you’re in, to eat and drink and be merry, to work and create and earn a living, to rest and love and build connection… all these are the point, and more.
This echos another realization I had in Denver some months ago. I was in a cab, headed downtown, and something I had noticed in my brief visit was how… dead it all felt. No pedestrians in the residential areas, packed highways criss-crossing a massive metro area, brown grass, massive expanses of empty landscape… Passing what appeared to be an idle roller coaster in the middle of downtown, I thought to myself, with some contempt, “what do people even do here?”
I’m used to Seattle, where it’s verdant and lush, and people only need the barest hint of sun to insist they go out and enjoy it, north face parkas and all. Sidewalks and green spaces are abustle and markets pop up all over. Even in the rain dogs are out walking their humans. These barren sidewalks and paved acres felt desolate. Dead.
And then I realized: they’re doing the same thing we do. The same thing the birds do. The coyotes slinking through our back yards. The chickens pecking in people’s hobby farms. the sheep in the dells of Ireland, the cows in the streets of India, the stray cats in the shops in Türkiye. They, and we, are living.
We’re born, we eat, we grow, we fuck, we live, and finally we die. All of us, all over the world, are doing our best to live. It looks different in different places, but at it’s core it’s the same. The meaning of life is life, to live it as best we can, where we can, when we can, and try not to ruin it for everyone else. The mere fact of our existence is evidence that we matter.
Finally finding that peace has been a double edged sword. With no fear of being meaningless, of becoming a burden and dying alone, my motivation to push to greater heights was tempered this summer by the quiet joy of a long hike, a hard workout, or a rainy paddle in a lake.
And yet I find I prefer this. I still honor my commitments, connect with my community, care for those around me who need it… but I less often feel fear the way I once did. I find that my new mantra brings me peace: the time is the point.