The shape of a life
July 30, 2008
A week’s wandered by since my sudden change in employment status. Strange days my friends: strange days that glom and stretch together in an unpredictable fashion. I haven’t had a week off in five years. My brain doesn’t know how to process this much unbroken time. I feel like some hard case corporate recidivist given parole: after eight years of sharpening spoons and fighting off boardroom buggery I don’t know how to live on the outside. I keep trying to exchange cigarettes for extra prescription benefits.
That may have been an overstatement. Or a lie. The absence of structure, however, has been troubling. My brain doesn’t naturally apportion time well, and my attention expands to fill the allowable space…becoming dissolute in the process. While I’ve carefully managed my internal world, the outer shape of my life has always been defined by obligations I’ve been under. Without that external pressure things have become a little formless.
To cope I drink a lot of tea. Like, crackhead amounts of tea. The agitation fills me with a jittery sort of purpose…a sense of forward momentum. Drink enough tea and you can watch CNN for hours without remorse. I’ve half convinced myself I’m in the late stages of interviewing for a gig as Obama’s speech writer. I mouth inspirational words at the T.V. and feel triumphant when he echoes my talking points. While unquestionably deranged, it’s more prestigious than my former pretend job as a Liberty City bounty hunter [1]. I need to get out of the house.
Tomorrow I acquire my severance riches, and try and track down my Psych degree. I suspect this will move things in a more productive direction. I’ll keep you posted.
[1] Mostly I just went around murdering cab drivers…which is really more vigilantism, than bounty hunting proper. Though, I still consider it a public service. Time to give the Jewish lass my X-Box for a while.
July 30, 2008 at 7:01 pm
can i suggest moving to europe? :)
July 31, 2008 at 9:08 am
So it finally happened eh? Well, welcome to opportunity my friend. There’s nothing quite like freedom from drudgery and a severance package to help you deal with it.
Good with figuring shit out.
PS
After making a comment in response to your thoughts on poetry I was inspired to write some. I offer it here, as it happens to be somewhat related to the subject at hand:
some would say that we are made of
actions taken
works complete.
others say we are but fleeting
memories of what could be.
others still
would argue
dreaming
is no different than
right now.
still somehow i think i ought to
figure out when and how
i should spend my waking hours
so that when i’m gone they’ll say
he was driven
he was happy
he made others feel this way.
July 31, 2008 at 9:09 am
Good ***luck*** with figuring shit out.
July 31, 2008 at 2:08 pm
There was a time when double Bergamot Earl Grey was my moonshine and I was its bitch…
Bergamot is a heart accelerant. One hasn’t lived until one has had as much of that tea as I used to drink and then handled endless heavy breakable objects full of pasta/cabbage/potatoes and then mopped floors…
Amorphous time is strange and angsty stuff for sure… Do keep us posted on what you do with it. I have a bit of my own to reckon with at present and I’d hate to reinvent the wheel if I don’t have to.
August 1, 2008 at 9:36 pm
You knew this was coming — a little songwriting genius courtesy of Chris Smither:
*gentle virtuoso guitar picking and foot tapping*
Hold On
Let it fly and lonely cry, everybody’s free
I will decide how I’ll be tied, but freedom, be there for me
We’ll build walls around our brain
Leave these prisons in our chains
And hold on
And I thought I had control, I tried
But now I would be satisfied
To hold on.
Tell me what to do, and I’ll tell you what I’ll say
My freedom will be measured by the length to which I’ll disobey
Tell me where to go
And I’ll freely tell you no
And I will hold on
But leave me on my own
And I’ll lock these shackles to my bones
And I’ll hold on.
Freedom for the soul is what we want, but when it fades
We’ll treat it like a burden, ‘til the devil feels he’s underpaid
We’ll drag that spirit door to door
’Til finally it can’t move no more
It just holds on
Now the only thing that’s truly free
Is this little voice that’s telling me
To hold on.