I can't help but feel like i've hit the bottom. Like i've fallen off a cliff and finally i've hit the ground. My body is sprawled out amongst the sediment and stones are digging in my back.
Do you ever find yourself wondering exactly how you got here? When the life you love stops making sense. I've admittedly made good and bad choices in the past two years, and all of my life for that matter. I recently had a long night with an old friend and his harsh words may have given me a little more perspective that I had imagined. The hardest question of them all being... "What are you doing with your life?" . This should be an easy question to answer. I have so many goals but I don't feel like I am on the path to any of them. I like to assume that everyone with a pulse goes through something like this at least once in their life. I have to assume that it is true otherwise I'm hopeless.
I have give up so many things that i never thought I would do. Broken so many promises to others and to myself that I was so intent on keeping. Three years ago my life was driven by seeing the world. It was what kept my heart pumping at a steady speed. When I first started seeing the world i was in and out of to many dysfunctional relationships to count and being able to hop on a plane kept me happy. It was all I wanted to talk about. Walking the city streets of London, New years eve on the Tower Bridge. Celebrations in Paris, the architecture at the Notre Dame. Coffee and baguettes for breakfast. It made missing school forgivable. I was building memories with my closest friends. Bringing them souvenirs that I bought from street vendors if they couldn't make the trip. I still have these ambitions but for so many reasons seem so far out of reach.
True not all things are bad, if they were I wouldn't be here. I would probably be in and out of different countries, serving coffee to save up for trips. Every penny. Its just more... complicated now. Its strange because I don't have many responsibilities, no children, mortgage, car payment. All of the things that force you to stay put. However I do have a relationship. The greatest and most important relationship of my life. Which is why I stay, and have stayed in Florida for the last two years. Love is the most powerful emotion, but where is it written that giving up so much is part of the deal. Its not, but I let it happen and now I'm punishing myself for it.
When I decided to stay in Florida indefinitely the most important requirement for me was to get back to school and finish. I was so close to getting my two year degree back home so that I could finally start focusing on the following two years and graduating. When I moved it was supposed to be for eight months maximum. Spring and Summer semester, its was an internship so thats good justification right? So when I stayed my main focus was to get back. Once we moved from orlando to west palm going to school was an option. I took two light semesters making up credits that didn't transfer and paying out of state tuition. Then money got unbelievably tight and my convenient part time job with Jamies mother went south. The owner of the company wanted to cut my hours from 35 to 15. and at eight dollars an hour that was impossible. I tried applying everywhere I could that was within walking distance of my home, that i could make at least enough money to cover rent. Everyone was on a hiring freeze. One morning after two weeks of searching and countless applications Jamies father called and said that a position in the company he worked for was looking for someone with minimal experience required for an accounts payable position that had recently opened up. I had no choice. I made the best of it for a while and told myself that after I settled in that I would return to school the next semester. The job is an 8-5 desk job that in the current economic state is incredibly stressful. I come home from work every night exhausted from the days work. How could I be expected to study and do homework like that? I, unfortunately, do not have the type of motivation it would require to do that. I have been working for A&P since July and i've grown more and more resentful of my willingness to take the job.
I had a conversation with my dad recently about the job and how I felt about it and he reassured me that in order to make the best of my situation I needed to change my attitude. Its a learning experience. I have tried and succeeded, for very short periods of time, in turning my self around and taking as much from the experience as I possible can. But I have realized that what I am learning is what I don't want for my life. At the very least what I don't want right now. I am to young and unexperienced to be wasting my time with a company that doesn't value me as an employee. I have worked so hard for the respect of my supervisors and managers than anyone else I have seen go in and out the revolving door in that place... yet i still don't have it. I am at the bottom of the corporate food chain. Even still I deserve some form of respect form my peers and on a daily basis am reminded that I won't get it. Unless you know one of the top corporate suits you are nothing but a name on the payroll list. I cannot work like this anymore.
I have become so unhappy with the job that it has been effecting me even after I leave the office. Emotionally and physically I am breaking and do not know how to fix it.
I am at the mercy of others good will, I don't have my own car therefore I rely on others to get me to and from work. The only way that this has been possible is that I ride with Jamie's dad everyday. So leaving the company to find something a little more suitable for me and my goals is unrealistic until i can get a car. Which is impossible considering I am barley scraping by as it is. I am financially strapped because we decided to live in brand-new condos in an expensive neighborhood. Not to mention the recent medical expenses. In the last two months I have spent hundreds of dollars that I don't have to try and fix a condition that could easily be blamed on my job. Most of the sicknesses or physical conditions I have experiences I have had in my life are related to something happening in my life. I had vowed to leave A&P by December. The week I decided that this was unrealistic was the week the nerve in my neck became pinched. I feel as though my head pain is a constant reminder that I am not taking care of myself. I am not following my goals. This is the saddest realization I have ever come to.
The sunday before Heidi and I packed up for Florida my family held a going away party in our honor. Every member of my family gave a toast to us. I have had the words of my dads toast running through my mind for months. "Decisions you make in life are insignificant as long as you are going somewhere. Its like driving a car, If you sit in idle for long enough you forget that you aren't moving and everything will pass you by. As long as you keep your foot on the gas you are making your life what you want it to be and that is the most important lesson in your life." I am idling. The car is running but in park. I've forgotten how to drive and the gearshift is broken. How do i fix it?
I am taking full responsibilities for the decisions I've made because no one could have made them for me. I made some of my decisions based on what is best not only for me but for Jamie as well. I took the full time job so that he could peruse his dreams. Somewhere along the way I let mine begin to slip through my fingers.
I am supposed to be graduating this year. If I had stayed on track I would have a completely different life. But thats not what I want. I don't want a different life I just want mine to get back on track. Do the things I said I was going to do. I feel like I am disappointing the one person whose approval I seek the most. My Father. He was so proud of me for so long. He told everyone of my travels and experiences as if they were his own. I don't know what he feels now because he is less inclined to tell me what he thinks of my decisions. I know that he isn't disappointed in me because he has made it very clear that no matter what he will always be proud. But he has warned me to be careful. He has always told me to do what makes me happiest. Never to settle for anything less. But right now I'm not doing that. I'm doing what I have to. I can't afford not to have my job. And it is the most significant factor to my current unhappiness. I know it needs to be fixed... and I have a better time frame of when that can happen but that isn't for another three or four months. I don't know if I can handle it.
It should feel a little better with the hopeful end in site but it doesn't. I can't help but wonder what circumstantial thing will keep me there? It is all unknown. I am wondering around in the dark searching for the exit and hoping that someone will be on the other side with open arms waiting to welcome me. To help me through the hell of finding a job that I might actually enjoy, considering I haven't enjoyed any work that i've done except in short bursts, since I left Utah. Two years.
The old me would have cut and run. Would have been selfish and bailed, moved home and started over. This time that isn't an option. I can't run from the one amazing thing I have going for me. And maybe this whole experience would be a little easier if he was more understanding of what I have given up and what I'm going through but I don't know if thats going to happen either. We both have a lot going on right now. I need to reconnect to myself. But right now the me I want to talk to seems so far out of reach...
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