Rambling
Yesterday included:
- A dreadfully boring day at work
- A 30 minute run after work
- Dinner with the boyfriend and a great new friend
- A talk about the future and possibility and changes
- Time alone to ponder everything
When I was a little girl I collected those little snow shakers. You know, the plastic ones that they sell in tourist shops with the iconic structures from whatever town you happen to be in. I used to have a whole collection on my dresser and I'd shake them and think about the places I'd been and what places I had yet to visit. Sometimes I wish that I could shake my life in the same way. Have some things stay in the same places, while everything else changes, if only for just a brief time.
Some people are afraid of change. I'm not. I like change. I crave it. But, I've come to understand that change for the sake of change isn't good. It becomes running away from where you are or what you're doing and you can't spend your whole life running. Or, I suppose, you can, but *I* don't want to. Sometimes I feel I'm chasing an ever-elusive happiness that exists only in the realm of fantasy.
About seven years ago, I was hunting for an apartment with a good friend of mine when we stumbled upon this old landlord who didn't have an apartment for us but did impart some good advice. He said that there are three things that determine happiness:
1. Where you live
2. What you do for work
3. Who you live with
He, who had never met either of us, looked us each in the eye and pleaded with us to think carefully about those three things. At the time, we giggled and talked about how creepy he was but his advice has stayed with me, tumbling around in the back of my head.
Where do I want to live? What city? Does a city make the girl happy or is the girl happy in whatever city she lives in? I've had a not-so-secret love affair with Vancouver for a long time but I fear that it's a romanticized ideal that I've created in my head. Yet, I love the bigness of the big city. I want to live in a city that has pockets of people interested in everything that I am. I loved opening up the paper in Vancouver and being overwhelmed by great, cheap, interesting things to do on any given day.
What do I want to do with my life? Where do I want to work? Ahhhh, these are the questions causing me the most grief. I am unconvinced that any office job is going to make me swoon. I like the stability of 9 - 5 and benefits and vacation days but I hate the mundaneness of coming into work every day to do the same kind of work. I am creative and a people person. I want to work on projects that I'm really proud of. I only have a very vague sense of what this all means.
Who do I want to live with? I think this question goes beyond roommates and is a bigger question about who do I want to share my life with. This one doesn't fill me with the same anxiety or trepidation as the others. I don't know ultimately where things will go with my current relationship but I feel confident that it's going to grow and hang around for a while and keep filling me with bits of happiness. I have conviction that it's healthy and right for me right now and it feels nice having at least one big thing sorted out.
Do you have answers for these questions? If so, how did you come to decisions about them? If not, are you actively trying to come to some resolution about them?
Well, my lunch break is over so I should get back to the unremarkable project that I've been assigned.
- A dreadfully boring day at work
- A 30 minute run after work
- Dinner with the boyfriend and a great new friend
- A talk about the future and possibility and changes
- Time alone to ponder everything
When I was a little girl I collected those little snow shakers. You know, the plastic ones that they sell in tourist shops with the iconic structures from whatever town you happen to be in. I used to have a whole collection on my dresser and I'd shake them and think about the places I'd been and what places I had yet to visit. Sometimes I wish that I could shake my life in the same way. Have some things stay in the same places, while everything else changes, if only for just a brief time.
Some people are afraid of change. I'm not. I like change. I crave it. But, I've come to understand that change for the sake of change isn't good. It becomes running away from where you are or what you're doing and you can't spend your whole life running. Or, I suppose, you can, but *I* don't want to. Sometimes I feel I'm chasing an ever-elusive happiness that exists only in the realm of fantasy.
About seven years ago, I was hunting for an apartment with a good friend of mine when we stumbled upon this old landlord who didn't have an apartment for us but did impart some good advice. He said that there are three things that determine happiness:
1. Where you live
2. What you do for work
3. Who you live with
He, who had never met either of us, looked us each in the eye and pleaded with us to think carefully about those three things. At the time, we giggled and talked about how creepy he was but his advice has stayed with me, tumbling around in the back of my head.
Where do I want to live? What city? Does a city make the girl happy or is the girl happy in whatever city she lives in? I've had a not-so-secret love affair with Vancouver for a long time but I fear that it's a romanticized ideal that I've created in my head. Yet, I love the bigness of the big city. I want to live in a city that has pockets of people interested in everything that I am. I loved opening up the paper in Vancouver and being overwhelmed by great, cheap, interesting things to do on any given day.
What do I want to do with my life? Where do I want to work? Ahhhh, these are the questions causing me the most grief. I am unconvinced that any office job is going to make me swoon. I like the stability of 9 - 5 and benefits and vacation days but I hate the mundaneness of coming into work every day to do the same kind of work. I am creative and a people person. I want to work on projects that I'm really proud of. I only have a very vague sense of what this all means.
Who do I want to live with? I think this question goes beyond roommates and is a bigger question about who do I want to share my life with. This one doesn't fill me with the same anxiety or trepidation as the others. I don't know ultimately where things will go with my current relationship but I feel confident that it's going to grow and hang around for a while and keep filling me with bits of happiness. I have conviction that it's healthy and right for me right now and it feels nice having at least one big thing sorted out.
Do you have answers for these questions? If so, how did you come to decisions about them? If not, are you actively trying to come to some resolution about them?
Well, my lunch break is over so I should get back to the unremarkable project that I've been assigned.
posted by Leah at
3:07 p.m.
7 Comments:
As someone in a *very* similar situation, I'm trying to approach it without fear, but rather excitement about what the future may hold. The biggest changes in my life were orchestrated externally, as in, weren't pushed ahead by MY actions.
This time, I'm taking control. Doing it for me, when and how I want to. Sure, I'll find a job and live with someone I like and CAN live with...but I'm doing it for ME, and nobody else...but if you wanna come, you should.
;)
oh man you guys. i'm totally coming with you. : (
leah, this post is so painfully real to me right now. my job is how i pay the bills, that is it. i dread people asking "what i do" in fear they will assume that is a defining item of my true self. because it's not. if his business was not based here, i'm pretty sure we'd be long gone too.
okay so i actually responded to two posts with my one i'm hungover and stupid today. :P
kim:
you might be hungover, but you're not stupid.
you can come anywhere that i go! you will always be welcome in my life!
I am in a very similar situation myself. Tired of renting, pursuing music but with people who perhaps aren't as into it as I am, questioning if it's what I want to do or whether I should pursue one of my many other interests...
It's a tough position, but a position that pretty much everyone goes through around this time in their life. So we mess around, we fuck things up, and we make things right til we figure it out. Hopefully.
i miss you. can we get together soon? (i know you can get this at work, otherwise i'd just email) ;)
Yes! Friday? I'll call you!
(My MSN stopped functioning during the day :( That's why I haven't been around).
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