About Me — Nathan Borson
Counting my privileges, wishing everyone had them
Hello, my name is Nate. My home is in Gustavus, Alaska, in the Tlingit Huna Kwan homeland, on the edge of a vast wilderness area, but I am writing this from McMurdo Station, where I am applying my computer skills this austral summer in the service of the US Antarctic Program. I’m an IT Pro by trade, having worked as a computer specialist for Glacier Bay National Park for 23 years and having co-owned a tiny computer and communications consulting business for nine years. Before I lucked into this line of work, I guided sea kayak trips (I co-founded Spirit Walker Expeditions, still in operation under new ownership more than 30 years later), processed fish and crab at a seafood plant, washed dishes, cooked, drove, installed burglar alarms, worked as a ranch hand, and installed solar hot water systems.
But I work to live, not the other way around. Even before my semi-retirement I arranged my life to spend my (boreal) summers sea kayaking, camping, hiking, and backpacking in my big, wild back yard. I love the sense of personal discovery that comes from finding something special that I did not expect. I seek out destinations I have not heard about, and I have often been where I felt I might be the first person to set foot. I treasure my time in habitats teeming with wildlife, my perception zooming out to take in the vast web of life in which humans are just one strand.
I am a systems thinker. I deeply ponder reality and “my” part of it. I have become highly skeptical about self, free will, consciousness, individuality, and duality. Once proud to be independent and self-reliant, I am now grateful to be an infinitesimal but very lucky part of a whole so great I cannot conceive it.
What is so special about you? What do you have that you were not given? And if it was given to you, how can you brag?
1 CORINTHIANS 4:7
I have surrendered any concept that I deserve or earned my great fortune — my freedom and leisure, my physical and mental health, my financial security, my great friendships and community, and my awesome family. The truth is I hit the jackpot in the birth lottery, and my luck has compounded ever since. It’s not that I haven’t worked hard or given back, but the very fact that I am able to do so is a result of my nature and nurture, gifts for which I can take no credit.
It pays to be a “white” male born in America in the early sixties to caring, respectful, mentally healthy middle-class parents. It also pays to be lucky. I wish my success derived less from historical and continuing racial injustice and from a lottery system that rewards good luck while further impoverishing those who suffer a bad break. I wish my privileges did not arise in part from others’ subjugation and loss, notably the dispossession of the Sioux who had lived on the land my family farmed in Minnesota. I believe there are fairer systems that ultimately result in greater prosperity and happiness for everyone. I believe with privilege come obligations. I hope to explore some of these topics in my writing here on Medium.
