Please, get me a hold of the ambassador’s house…

Like most people in the United States–and the world for that matter–I technically don’t have enough money to live in the city in which I reside, a city that has been known to cost a more than fair amount to be in. As is the prudent thing, I have spent my days trying to rectify this situation vis a vis the job search. Searching for employment is a somewhat paradoxical pursuit; indeed, you scour employment websites, polish resumes and tweak cover letters to exhaustion and at day’s end feel like you’ve accomplished less than nothing.

I’ve found that the key to keeping my spirits up is to break up the monotony by either: watching Law & Order, drinking at midday–yes; until I’m somewhat drunk–or reading. The first is always great, though we seem to be in a cycle of episodes I’ve already seen; the second is problematic on several levels and really isn’t an interesting enough pastime; the third always worthwhile provided the literature is up to snuff. Having already exceeded my Stoli and tonic intake for the week–and the next week too–I decided to float over to the bookshelf and peruse the selection. Kafka? No. Camus? Cover letter crafting has melted my brain a little too much for my boy. Into The Wild? I knew it to be a tale of a young white boy who died after dropping out of the world and going back to nature. Seemed engrossing enough, so I settled in and read it.

While I won’t sit here and give you an entire book review, I will say it was an enjoyable read. I both admired and despised the young man in question and any time a story can make you feel conflicted, you should chalk that up as a decent day’s read. One of the many question I, and others, asked throughout the story is,

“Is man equipped to survive in nature? Is nature natural to us any longer?”

Later that same evening, the misses and I were watching the news and sat in dismay as it appears subway fare hikes are on the horizon, though the broadcasters half-heartedly attempted to keep it a matter of speculation–as if a billion-dollar budget deficit would not come directly out of the pocket of the consumer. I went to bed with that familiar feeling I seem to go to bed with frequently these days; that less-than-hopeful feeling you have when you’re down to your last few dollars and don’t have any idea where the next few are coming from. It’s that foreboding feeling, as if someone slipped a slender hand underneath your chest and is gently massaging your heart in a completely unflattering way.

I woke up this morning and did the price hike figures. A twenty dollar fare increase for a one month unlimited ride metro card. A cool hundred dollars to ride to and fro with the other sad souls with a hand on the heart. Still in bed, I contemplated life as I know it: I’m a college graduate whose real skills and interests people tend to think should come for free, especially when there’s not too much money to go around. So, as a true son of Eli, I contemplated the next possible step: Law school. It’s the only thing I could think of that I could do that would very likely pay dividends if I so desired. Yes; it costs a lot, but, so does drama school and plenty of those degrees never, ever, ever bear fruit.

This isn’t a long, convoluted way to explain my decision to go to law school–though I suppose I’m still considering it–but rather I’m spelling out a thought process. Why would I ever consider doing something I have little interest in? Money, of course. And what does telling you of my sitting unemployed and enriching my mind through literature tell you? Hopefully something about man in his natural habitat.

I woke up this morning and did my figures and pondered law school and pondered this book I read while unemployed and came to this thought:

Modern Society–as man now knows it–is his most natural habitat. To survive in said habitat the only tangible resource necessary is money. Money is of singular importance because it allows man to gather what he needs to survive in the habitat and the pursuit thereof is thus amoral.

Now, I acknowledge that there is a particularly Western point of view inherent in the above. I also acknowledge that it is predicated upon a society that places value on money. Certainly the matter will be different when that is no longer the case, but until then I’m inclined to explore this further.

One of the common refrains from those who thought Chris McCandless was a delusional dreamer who had no respect for the Alaskan wilderness is that modern man is no longer equipped to survive the way he was attempting to survive. And those that can survive in that way are far more knowledgeable about the way to do it. Without the proper preparation, man simply no longer has a place in the wilderness. We’ve just plain forgotten what it takes.

Still, it’s not an utter impossibility. Man is still atop the food chain. Why? Because of our ability to be prepared, our ability to acquire knowledge, set rabbit traps, preserve meat and stay warm over the winter months. Fortunately and unfortunately, we’re not only able to adapt to a habitat, we’re also able to bend it to our will–until it bends back of course.

The stakes for modern man are different than they once were and here is where the question of amorality in pursuit of the only resource that matters comes into play. Save for our friends in PETA and the like, no one thinks those who hunted and trapped game were wrong for doing that which they deemed necessary to survive. Before we started overdoing it, felling trees so you could build a house was alright. Why? Because it was cold outside. But the question is different now. Man has money as an intermediary to the jobs he used to do. Want food? Pay for it. Need shelter? Pay for it. In fact, money’s something more than an intermediary because it affects every aspect of life; indeed, it costs money to do things that don’t cost money.

But there’s another piece to this puzzle. Immoderation is, and has been, the new moderation. To have enough is to have too little. This is where man’s ability to bend his habitat to his will comes into play. Being reasonable simply isn’t any fun. It isn’t simply a matter of surviving; rather, it is a matter of surviving comfortably.

Money is the means by which modern man survives. It’s both gun and deer; ax and shelter. Show me a person who is surviving well without money andI’ll show you a college student with a benefactor. Currency matters because it has a limitless amount of influence; it is able to do the work we no longer wish to do or are capable of doing. The things you can’t get with money–love, contentment, self-esteem–are the same things you can’t get without it. Yes; mo’ money, mo’ problems, but I think we often fail to see money for what it is: A resource. Money is often the patsy for human shortcomings. Perhaps, more fairly, it’s mo’ people, mo’ problems. Is money the root of all evil or is the desire to consume?

As I pondered this question of the interplay between money and morality–and under the umbrella of morality I’m placing generally agreed upon tenets of character, integrity, decency, etcetera–I found that money and morality were both powerful forms of currency, but only one can help you survive without prejudice. Am I saying that there’s no room for decency? Of course not; I am a person who is consistently awed and humbled by human decency. I’m merely pointing out that but having the first and last month’s rent does the work that the favors of friends eventually cannot.

I have to admit that this argument gets entirely more complex for those individuals who no longer have to hunt. When the need to pursue is no longer there, what is the impulse? Perhaps it’s simply a matter of desire which can no longer be governed. But the question being raised is based on having that which allows him or her to survive, not indulge.

For those of us still in the hunt, for those of us who have neither venison for the winter or a comfortable place to store, does the question of morality truly apply? On the physical plane on which we exist, would we not concede that mere righteousness rarely puts food in your mouth or a roof over your head? This is not to say that I’m all for survival at any cost; I still find infringing upon another’s life to be generally out of bounds, though I am willing to give a degree of latitude to that which a person considers self-defense.

Truly, this question hinges greatly on the matter of socialization. I, and others, have been shown time and again that money matters and, by and large, we believe that. We’ve also been told otherwise so we don’t go bat-shit crazy and truly give way to our baser instincts i.e. the pursuit of the truly important resource. Does this exonerate the drug dealers and gun runners and robber barons of the world? Kind of. Not fully, but kind of. As we tend to forget, most drug dealers and the like–and yes Wall Street, you get grouped in there too–are not wealthy and take part in the business for no other reason than to make money, the resource they need to survive. Period. If they could make the same kind of money selling fruit baskets, I’d wager most would (there’s always that percentage that like the danger. Idiots). We find them to be a tricky bunch because they work outside the law to give the society something it quietly craves and will cause bloodbaths and destroy communities in order to give society that which it quietly craves. We don’t so much begrudge them their money as we don’t like to see the blood and the mess.

This is a question of man’s nature. We tend to forget that we are animals. We do that which needs doing to survive, live in a society that appeals to that survival instinct and then hope that we have the decency to be “better than that.” We are animals. Yes; I’d argue we are the most complex in the animal kingdom but members of the kingdom nonetheless. It’s not essential that I know how to preserve a moose–though it probably should be. It matters little that I don’t know how to find water in the desert–though I may one day regret that. It does matter however that I find a solution to a twenty dollar hike in my monthly expenses. And righteousness isn’t it. Peace to John Krakauer.