Simplicity, Simplicity, Simplicity

I am re-reading Walden. Not a Scandinavian bloodfest (though like many my age I always suspected something deeply wrong about the Muppet Swedish chef) but Thoreau's account of and musings on his time spent in a cabin a mile or so away from his home-town.

Something in that struck a particular chord with me - his calculations about the food he grew and ate. As mentioned some time back in this blog, I am keeping a record of expenditure on and estimated value of food grown in our garden and allotment. Thoreau's was calculated to the nearest half cent, somewhat improbably. But what hit home from that information was how simply he lived - growing rye, potatoes, a little beet and so on, plus catching the occasional 'mess' of fish in Walden Pond, and a dish of purslane picked from the land on which he was squatting.

His calculations were as much concerned with how little time it took to earn or through his own labour to grow enough to live on, happy as he was to survive on a basic diet. The time left allowed him to think.

The title of this post is perhaps the most famous quotation from his book, a line I read last night that immediately made me think of the exact opposite that so many will be living through this Christmas.

We won't be having an austere Christmas in any sense, but I do intend to keep things simple. The traditional British turkey assault course on Christmas Day naturally, but otherwise keeping to the sufficient and unadulterated: an air dried ham that can be picked at for weeks (Aldi advertising a Serrano ham for £49.99 I think) kept in the cold of our conservatory; a cliche but still wonderful, Stilton and Port of an evening to stretch the time and conversation at the dinner table; my own bread; plenty of fruit; simple salads quickly made.

Thoreau was most contented when alone, feeling solitude facilitated his thinking. I love the company of my family and our friends (real friends, not FaceBook ones or similarly vague acquaintances). Talk - notoriously cheap I'm glad to say - with them over the table is a real luxury, and unlike Thoreau I feel such company engenders thought, which just as it was for him is another luxury for me.