Two days ago I bought $5.00 worth of icecream.

That may not seem very significant until you realize something about me; among other things I am a near mizer with money. I'm not one to waste it on extravagent or extraneous things. It comes from my desire to always work towards something productive. Even my "free time" isn't really time to let loose- I always find a way to make that free time purposeful. And this comes from a list of virtues and morals that I have contemplated and written down to live by. It's kind of my neo-bible.

I don't like being stagnant or wasteful so I don't alot time to things I find silly or meaningless. Generally, it makes me happy to live this way, but at times it really makes the world exhausting and colorless.

So when I say I bought $5.00 worth of icecream, its something that is very uncharacteristic of me.

But you know what? It was absolutely delicious. It was nearly a pound of icecream: yellow cake batter ice cream with rainbow sprinkles and fruity cereal bits. It was my world for the 8 minutes it took me to eat it.

I could think of at least 10 things off the top of my head that that 5 dollars could be spent better on, but I've got to say... I don't really care.

I bought the ice cream because I wanted to. There was no logical reason, I wasn't particularly hungry, it wasn't a bargain, nor was the shop close by. There was nothing inherently "good" or worthwhile per se for getting the icecream. In fact, when I was done eating I felt slightly sick.

But I was happy. I was happy!

If I needed now to go back and justify my actions I would say that I spent $5.00 on an insight: there are things in the world that are neither inherently good or bad, worthwhile or wasteful, if these things would make you happy, do them: if you will it, do it. Just because it doesn't seem to have any use in particular, doesn't make that thing bad. And just because something has good use, doesn't make it inherently good. In fact, the goal of discerning between "goodness" and "badness" is to find those actions that will make you happy. Discerning is not always an easy task. The virtue is happiness, but I lost sight of the purpose and just focused on "is it worth it?".

The fact that the way I was living didn't make me entirely happy helps remind me that I certainly don't have all the answers as to what is virtuous and what is not. Because of my pride in the course of trying to find a straight, faultless path to walk in life, I fell pray to the lie that the truth is predictable and easily found. It's not. Truth is only ever most evident in retrospect.