Category: time
Let me preface this by saying that I am an adult. (Sometimes.) I’ve had full-time jobs, and I have lived in my own apartment. The apartment, however, was five minutes from where I grew up. I like where I grew up, so this was not a problem for me. And though I went away to college two hours away from where I grew up, I’ve never actually LIVED any distance from home. College is completely isolated and different. In three weeks, that is changing. I am moving an hour and a half for my new job. And I am scared (good scared, I think, but still scared).
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I read somewhere that whatever you do on New Year’s Day is what you will be doing for the rest of the year. I’m more superstitious than I care to admit, so I took it by heart. If superstitions prove to be true, then this is what I can expect from the rest of my year:
- Huge breakfasts with delicious mimosas
- Writing! (I have had a little bit of writer’s block the past few weeks, and I THINK I broke through, so that was exciting)
- Harry Potter movies
- Driving snowy roads (gross!)
- Eating chocolate chip cookies
- Reading books
I can’t say that any of this is shabby. Especially all of the food.
What do you expect in your New Year?
I don’t know what I am going to blog about.
I usually like to plan these things in advance. I try to be interesting for you all. I really do.
Today though, everything is uncertain. My life, my job. I’m twenty-seven years old, and I don’t know for sure where I’m going to be in a month.
I envy the people in my life who don’t plan. I envy the people who can pick up and move across the country, without a job in line, without an idea of where they are going.
I like to know what’s coming next. I like stability and continuity. I’m not saying that every day has to be exactly the same, because how boring would that be? But I have a routine, and I like it.
When it goes away, when it gets taken from me, I feel like the rug is pulled out from under my feet. Where was the warning? Where is that stability I was promised?
The routine gives me control. I’ve been searching and searching for jobs and boyfriends and friends and apartments and all sorts of things for years now. Routine gives me power. It’s something that I can change, that I can do, that I can accomplish.
And now it’s all fraying away. And I am sick and I am lost, and I don’t know what to do.
Everyone keeps telling me that I need to just worry about enjoying the holidays, and I am going to try. But with this hanging over me? How can I think about anything else?
I wish there were 25, 30 hours in a day. This past week I have been stressing myself out over everything I have to do, everything that needs to be done, and everything that I want to do.
At work, there is reams of paperwork to do, plus essays and projects to grade, plus lesson-planning to accomplish. All this on top of actually, you know, teaching. And interacting with the students and my colleagues.
When I get home, there is an apartment to clean (who knew I would be such a neat freak before I moved into my own place?), books to read, writing to do, generally more stuff from work that I brought home. Plus, I need to work out. And cook.
Of course, all of this is if I’m not tired. If I am tired? Forget about it. I don’t get anything done.
The worst is between the hours of 3 and 6. I feel so drained that I am lucky if I can do anything with myself besides stare at a computer screen. This three hours of dramatic nothingness puts me off schedule, which just stresses me out even more. Then I work to quickly get things done, and it’s always a mess.
How do we find more time? I want to write, I want to relax, I want to feel like I am not running from one place to another all of the time. I hate being stressed. I am done with being stressed.
So give me more time. Please?
