Mini-Epiphanies

I have been avoiding blogging of late and I don’t know why. Maybe it’s that I don’t feel like I have anything to say – which hardly seems possible with the amount of crap running around in my brain these days but, well – there it is. I’ve come to a major decision and I’m still sort of reeling from it and I guess that’s the only real news at this point. I’m quitting my job…and I don’t have anything else lined up to replace it.

It occurred to me this past weekend that I’ve been living my life as though I’m punishing myself for something I can’t identify and that this mentality has touched on nearly every aspect of my life up to and including this damn job that I hate and have needed to ditch for well over a year now. I was standing in the cold on the landing outside my apartment smoking, watching the traffic on Lincoln, thinking not much of anything and two things came drifting through my head: “Where are you?” then “Why am I doing this?” Now, keeping in mind I tend to get a bit maudlin when I smoke late at night by myself in the cold, the results of such thoughts tend to be a bit melodramatic and ultimately short-lived both emotionally and practically. This time, it’s different. I’m quitting my job and I’m not planning on trying to find another one even really remotely like it.

So who is it I’m waiting for? And why aren’t they here? Well, what I finally verbalized for myself around this issue is that I always imagine myself in a relationship – the relationship at some point in the future – a future in which I have lost my excess weight, my excess social caution, my excess insecurities about my intelligence and general worth and where I’ve finally managed to both write and sell my books (quite successfully) and am no longer a slave to the wage grind-basically the point at which I imagine I will have become good enough-for whatever. I’ve been waiting for the punishment to end – for the moment at which I’ll have paid enough for whatever crime it is I’ve been trying to atone for my whole life. No, this revelation didn’t include any indication of what this crime might have been…that’s still in review. What it did include is a sense of my own stupidity…that and some anger for all this wasted time and for the sneaking suspicion that I’ve really, despite everything I’ve ever said to the contrary, been feeling sorry for myself for a long, long time and that’s irritating the shit out of me. So, I’m done with the waiting until I achieve this mythical transformation-I’m taking my first step here – I’m quitting my job without much of a safety net…now it’s your turn. Where- the fuck- are you?

The ‘why-am-I-doing-this’ portion of the equation actually had more to do with the smoking than anything. When you think about it though – I stopped eating meat and started smoking again (for no apparent reason). One choice for my health, the next to destroy it so I’m thinking this is more on the whole ‘punishment-for-my-as-yet-unidentified-crime’ front. That or the fear thing…the fear being – if I were to somehow achieve that state in which I’d finally feel like I deserve the good things most people get to enjoy, what happens then? What if it’s not all it’s cracked up to be, eh? That sort of silliness…still another thought around this: I once heard someone say they had to have at least one vice to feel as though they were really alive and I remember thinking at the time how incredibly stupid that was and dismissing their argument without giving it even a moment’s consideration. Now, I’m not so sure except that it still sounds stupid…by this theory, I’m driven to pollute my lungs so that I’m reminded that I’m alive?? No, that’s just…stupid. No more smoking, then-that and I’m quitting my job.

Quitting my job is tied to the rest of this if only because, along with the questions and the thoughts generated by them, I’ve passed my breaking point around the issue and I am unwilling to try to continue to ignore it in service to my fear and general sense of practicality. I have enough resources to be okay for long enough to work something out financially…at least, I believe I probably do. This is not to say there isn’t a small voice screaming in terror in the back of my mind, reminding me of the bills and the need to eat and the kitties who depend on me for everything their furry selves need. Even still, I can’t heed that fearful voice any more-not in this, this time there’s a surer voice telling me my sanity and emotional well-being (I’m cringing at the melodrama here) are best served by changing course, by heading off into the less predictable. If I could, I’d be screaming. Here is my cliff – I’m stepping off – and I’m terrified of where I might fall but I’m really, really hoping I might actually have some wings (please forgive the corniness – I couldn’t help myself, seemed to fit with all the melodrama).