Home Depot Illimunati

I used to joke that if the Illuminati does indeed exist, their greatest accomplishment is Home Depot.

I thought of that again this morning as I was taking leaves. My home office window looks out into my lovely yard, graced with numerous enormous maple and beech trees. Unchecked, leaf accumulation gets to a foot or more of wet, packed, smelly mouldy matter by spring. This year I am resolved to keep up with it, and get out there to clear small patches, even though the trees above are still half filled with trembling, turning leaves.

Weeks ago I was rather stressed, eying my finances (which do NOT include leaf removal) along with the ticking by of the season and what I know to be the massive job ahead. I've had some success in moderating the stress by simply acknowledging making note of it and letting it go; also, though, by not leaving it all till the end, and taking advantage of every free half hour on a nice day to enjoy the air and revel in the exercise.

And so I was out there this morning, and I remembered my old joke about the Home Depot Illuminati.

It goes something like this:

If indeed there is a giant powerful international cabal, intent on seizing and holding control of our political and economic systems, what better success could they hope to have than Home Depot?

Think about what Home Depot successfully promotes.

If you are a homeowner, it is your single largest and greatest investment. If you are not, you are supposed to aspire and work toward it. After all, the greatest form of middle class welfare given the mortgage interest tax deduction.

Well, this, your home, is in constant and unending need of improvement. Even if it isn't actually falling down around you, you are continually told - through trillions of dollars of very well developed glossy commercials; entire sections of the newspaper - that is needs to be brighter, prettier, glossier, larger. Marble. Stainless steel appliances. Skylights! Renovated kitchens!

If you even halfway listen to this constant drumbeat you can spend every spare cent (hell, go into debt if there's none to spare) and every spare minute improving your home. Otherwise you are worthless! Inadequate!

As Betty Friedan said about housework, home improvement now expands to fill all available time.

So, back to the Illuminati part. If the goal is a populace that doesn't care about politics, or public policy, or how society invests its resources, what better way to achieve it than this? (Or doesn't have time to care; maybe the same thing.)

Cause or effect? Kinda doesn't matter.

I've seen Michael Moore's Sicko since developing this theory and think he's got it even more right. Americans are overworked, overextended, and feeling fundamentally really vulnerable about the increasing disconnect between the lifestyle we are told to want, the actual cost of living (even without plasma tvs), juxtaposed against real earnings; and the fact that for many years we have experienced no political hope or sense of our own power and effectiveness. In France, the government is afraid of the people, Moore concludes; here, the people are afraid of the government.

I do have to say, I almost can't bear to watch any more news. The unavoidable economic black hole combined with the possibility (however remote) of a McCain/Palin administration is almost too much to bear. (Although I do feel increasingly free to prepare to celebrate Tuesday.)

However: I have decided to enjoy raking the leaves this year. I do not have to bag them, instead throwing tarps full off a steep hill that leads to a riverbank. That's a kind of wild, joyous feeling in itself. It makes a wonderful, massive compost pile, and the kids love to jump in them. And I can use the mental time to muse, reflect on work and other things, dream up barely read blog posts.