Truth be told, I don’t fully know what Indolence Industries is about, unless it’s about finding out what it’s about.
But I have figured out a few things by now, and I’ll update the About page as I figure out more.
Indolence is not laziness; it's closer to leisure. It’s the experience of having nothing you absolutely must do, and the chance to do whatever you want. Even nothing, if that’s what you want. For me, indolence leans on the absence of the structure of a job, school, child-rearing—though I don’t think that’s true for everyone. Indolence can be frightening, daunting and tremendously appealing. All at once. Chaos and opportunity bound together with a sturdy, colorful ribbon and tied with a big, loose bow that dares you to pull on the knot.
Relief from time pressure is also a key part of the practice of indolence—though, come to think of it, a belief in the finiteness of your life may help with indolent industry. But near-term deadlines are deadly to indolence. You can’t reach true indolence on a one-week vacation. At least, I’ve never been able to.
Industry and its plural are not meant to bring visions of twentieth-century factories belching dark gray stinky smoke into the air, while crates of semiconductor capital equipment flow out the door onto trucks to be delivered to large airplanes that take them to primarily Asia. (Random example bearing no intended resemblance to persons living or dead.) The surname of Indolence Industries represents the more general concept of production: what you do, what you create, what you make. Tangible or intangible.
Maybe industriousness would be a more precise word. But it’s too darn long. And for heaven’s sake, the plural is a soggy mess.
When indolence and industry collaborate, surprises can arise. I was rather hoping they would, when I started down this non-path. A lifelong desk potato, a head in a jar whose body was expected to do little more than carry around the jar, I was shocked to find that in my first year of indolence, my industry took the unprecedented form of hiking, cycling, swimming and pickleball. Where did that come from? And now, as I begin my second year of indolent industry, stories are pouring out. Were they in there all along?
By the way, the term retirement feels wholly wrong for this period of my life. While it’s true I’ve retired from my career, I’m fully energized to welcome in any other parts of me that emerge, any beckies who have been hiding for the first two trimesters of my life.
Not everyone needs to be retired from work and past raising young kids to find their indolence industries. Waiting this long turned out to be my path, but I’m a highly serial person. My husband says I suffer from Attention Surfeit Disorder.
I also worried that if I tunneled through the edifice of Corporate Becky I might find nothing there. Seriously. I can almost forgive me for waiting so long.
But there is something there: a heck of a lot of words, hours of entertainment putting them together, and relief for not having to keep them stopped up inside the jar.
Stay tuned. And heartfelt thanks for being here with me.
[Photo creds: Me. A scene from earlier this year at the Lighthouse Inn in West Dennis, MA. One of my happy places.]
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