Off Track

Yesterday I put in a long day at the ticket center and meandered home, stopping by the grocery store to buy some dinner ingredients, contemplating taking a pilates class later in the day.  But my beau texted to inquire about chocolate, and next thing I knew I was trekking up to his new place, and then up the rest of Passyunk hand in hand in the beautiful, still-sunny evening.  Everyone on the street seemed to be happy; dogs licked our hands as we passed.  We pawed through clothes at my favorite thrift store, looking for pieces of our costumes for my birthday party (Friday the 13th, pls dress accordingly).  We peered in shops and ate kibbeh and hummus for dinner.  The walk home was chillier, but I made tea and we ate strawberries amd woke up happy. 

This is what I want more of in my life: pleasure, spontaneity, company sometimes. 
What I want less of in my life: anxiety, feelings of incompetence and inadequacy.

As I talked with the beau about some job opportunities I’ve applied for and how I feel about them, I realized that I have been on a career track for as long as I’ve been out of college.  Before that, actually: I applied and was accepted to Teach for America in the fall before I graduated, and though I didn’t intend to be a career educator, I felt smug for having my post-graduate plans so squared away.  It didn’t take me too long to decide that I actually wanted to teach college, and from that point on – 2004, that was! – I was pointed in the direction of a distant version of myself, Professor Danglyearrings of Arts and Literature.  And, years later, when I realized that this vision was even farther off than I imagined, that it may not even be possible or desirable, I jumped track and kept right on rolling toward a hopeful new future as Editor, Book Doctor, and Word Genius.

And everytime someone asked me how I was, I would look at myself against of mental checklist of what I should have gotten done: have I had any interviews?  Successful ones?  Have I written anything on my dissertation lately?  Anything good?  Am I on track to graduate at by a fixed point in the future?  Am I on track to get a good job anytime, ever?

The answers, you can imagine, are usually pretty disappointing.  How can they be anything but?

I realized that even when I said that I wasn’t, I was measuring my worth and satisfaction by whether or not I was making what the university would call “reasonable progress.”  Reasonable progress is never clearly defined.  In my head, I defined it as working on scholarship for as many hours as possible every day.  Even days that I am at my day job for 8 hours.  Also, making reasonable progress toward my life goals, whatever they are. 

But now it’s spring, and it’s so pretty outside to walk everywhere, and strawberries are coming into season and taste so good with vanilla sugar sprinkled over them.  I want to write, I have a lot to write about.  I may become the kind of person who works in order to live in order to write.  But it’s not the most important thing I do.  And it’s not something I do in order to get something else.

And it is so, so relieving to have gone off the rails.