Many handy things around the house are ugly—which is why I can’t stand practicality
We Finns love plastic tablecloths, rain canopies, Gore-Tex pants, and merino wool base layers. Everything is accounted for, and it’s unbearable, writes Anna Brotkin in her column.
I will make a confession and hope they won’t revoke my Finnish passport for it. But even with that risk, here it goes: I can’t stand practicality.
To clarify, I can’t stand it when things are mainly justified by practicality. I don’t understand why practicality is always the top priority for so many people, trumping everything else. Only after it do values like beauty and fun come into play.
What I can least tolerate is when practicality lovers try to convert me. I’ll never give in—impracticality is my religion!
From my perspective, the practical solution is often the dullest, ugliest, and least fun choice. There’s no excitement or joy in practicality. All risks have been ironed out, leaving only the predictable certainty of how things will go. Everything is compatible, suitable, well thought out, sensible, and seamless—in other words, fatally boring.
“What I can least tolerate is if practical people try to convert me too. I’ll never give in!”
Thirty-seven years of anthropological sampling has convinced me that Finland ranks as one of the top countries in practicality. We Finns love plastic tablecloths (“just wipe them clean”), rain canopies (“in case it rains”), Gore-Tex pants (“the wind won’t blow through”), and merino wool base layers (“then you won’t get cold”). We’re prepared for everything.
I’ve also lived in France, which is noticeably less practical than Finland. If a French person gets cold, they’ll just pull on two pairs of jeans. If a Finnish person gets cold, that phrase is practically an oxymoron, because it never really happens. Every Finn is basically born with a merino wool base layer attached.
Certainly, practical can be beautiful too, but often times things are purely practical. Many handy things around the house are ugly. Who would call Venetian blinds, entryway mud rugs, or drying racks beautiful? Exactly.
Of course, some practicalities make perfect sense. If you’re standing on a sailboat deck for ten hours in pouring rain, Gore-Tex and merino wool start to sound appealing even to me. No problem there.
There’s definitely a place for practicality—several, in fact—but I’m not going to let it dictate all my life choices. No, thank you.
“If you leave no trace of your life, have you really lived?”
Many people live their lives thinking about how to get by with as little effort as possible—easily, quickly, and optimally—so nothing goes wrong.
But if you optimize everything and cut out every detour, you miss a lot of fun. Practical people never get lost. They don’t know what it’s like to be surprised by a sudden downpour, how the wind cuts right into your bones, or how a shirt feels when it sticks to your skin in a summer rain. They have no clue how unforgettable a wedding ceremony in a storm can be, how the morning sun feels shining straight through the bedroom window, or how a stain on a tablecloth can remind you of a lovely evening.
If there’s no trace of your life left anywhere, have you really lived?
