The One Where We Follow The Grumpy Traveler

Out of all the chapters that I saw in passing in the book Geography of Bliss I chose the last one, America. I didn't choose it necessarily because it was a theme I am familiar with, but because the line accompanying the title struck a chord in me.

HAPPINESS IS HOME

Eric Weiner chose to come back to America after nearly a decade of being abroad by entering through Miami, at first by the prompting of a friend by simply say Dockominium. When he finally did get there, it was to find out his friend had died of a sudden heart attack and chose to actually move to Miami with his wife. The first thing he points out is that Miami (and America in general) take almost an aggressive stance to promote happiness, mentioning Thomas Jefferson's words in the Declaration of Independence, "Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness".  He also notes that the study of happiness in the US had been majorly stable and only marginally affected by situations like the Cuban Missile Crisis of '62 or 9/11. He also takes notice of the peculiarity of this fact considering that divorce, suicide, mental disorders, violent crimes and other factors seem to be increasing. Weiner then speaks about how America subsists not on the idea of happiness but on the notion of hope to one day be happier than they are at the moment also mentioning that, "Americas current fixation with finding happiness coincides with an era of unprecedented material prosperity"  which makes it seem like the only happiness Americans can get is by possessing more property or material things.

I differ on this stance because while I don't doubt this complex of having a lot of material things or wanting to have more than someone else exists, the experiences I've had with most US citizens today is that they are barely scraping by with what they have yet they still manage to be happy. I take this to be something akin to Judith Fein's experience with the Vietnamese citizens after the war. They are honestly just happy to be alive and be able to feed their families, and he mentions something similar to this when throwing the Self-help books under the bus by saying that instead of searching inwards for happiness like the books suggest it is better to look outward to the happiness a close bond to another person can give you.

Weiner states at one point that although he has attempted to like Miami, he just cant seem to and wonders if he would enjoy it more if he was latino and he asked a Cuban American friend of his why the Latin people were so happy given their relative poverty to which he answers that it is in part on their focus on family, which gives you a sense of focus and sense of meaning.

Near the end  of the chapter he speaks to two women, one who moves every few years as she gets angsty if she is one place for too long and the other who is a two time cancer survivor who has lived in the same place for 22 years. He came to the conclusion that the lack of happiness one felt could be caused by a lack of commitment, one woman doesn't like living in one place. With the other woman is where the notion of home came to play, when prompted by Weiner to tell him where she would want to die instead of where she considers home to which she answers Vermont, the place where she grew up instead of Asheville where she currently lives.

This brings an interesting theme in to play, where would you want to die if you lived somewhere other than the place you were born?

That is a question I cannot answer right now, as I am living in the very island I was born on. But when I look to the future, a future I can only see being lived in New York or Washington D.C, when I die if I am in either of those places or somewhere else I would like to be buried in Puerto Rico. This is simply because my family will be there, my mother is buried here. This in turn brings us back to family, a theme I believe is fundamental in the pursuit of happiness, it doesn't necessarily have to be biological family. It is finding someone you love to be with, having a close bond to someone is a profound sense of happiness that I do not believe anyone can be without.

In the end, what drew me to this chapter was the quote Happiness is Home, because as I mentioned a few blog posts back I do believe home is where your heart is. Mine will always be with my father and niece and the friends who have been with me through the hellish parts of my.

As ever, I leave you with a song from ANOTHER musical. This one tells of the story of a year and the different ways to measure it be it deaths, love, happiness or friends.

Good Night ladies, gents and celestial beings!