Yesterday, I wrote a long and whiny piece about having too many of the “wrong” options for how I spend my time. I was feeling bored and cooped up and I didn’t want to be productive. The cold, gray day didn’t help. Underpinning not wanting to be productive was this emotional shrug that asks, “what’s the point?” No matter how much I’ve mentally prepared for what I knew would be a season of rejections (trying to: get published, re-enter the dating scene, find a job), I still hit walls and pout and give up. Yesterday, I wanted to give up. Yesterday, I wanted someone else to wake me out of my slump. Yesterday, I was yearning for something easy or at least a roadmap of sorts. I wanted someone else to come up with the game plan or disrupt my day or show me something new. As ridiculous as it sounds, I was feeling tired of being in charge of my life and my entertainment / happiness / fulfillment / ambitions.
Instead of shaking myself loose, I spent much of the day writing a few sloppy paragraphs about how not having good routines is hampering my efforts at… living a full and enriching life. I only partially believe that. When I begin to feel stuck, I tend to get overly analytical. I start to break my life down in a “get back to basics” sort of way. I start to look at my time and effort as though it were a profit and loss statement or a project to be managed. I begin to think that with better benchmarks and time management, I might hit my quarterly goals – whatever those might be.
I’m in a weird space right now. I’m living with significant ambiguity. I’m usually pretty good with ambiguity. I pride myself on being able to roll with things. But this has been going on for several months and this past week it started to hit me. I’m hesitant to commit myself to anything local or new because I plan on leaving. I’m excited about learning and seeing new things and meeting new people, but I’m working through closing out my current obligations. Last week, I tried two or three different times to write about being in limbo (with where I’m living, with the job search, with my writing, with pursuing romantic escapades) but was utterly unhappy with the results. I suspect yesterday’s attempt at writing about my desire for and distaste of routine was just a different mask on the face on feeling stuck. If I can’t take bold steps to control the outcome, maybe I should focus on routine and practice – at least that’s what I was thinking.
I can’t rule out that these feelings are part of April’s discontent (grumble and shake my fist at colorful and cheery tulips). The days grow longer and I’m beginning to crave breaking the week up with pleasant conversation in the waning light of a warm Tuesday evening over drinks at a cafe bar. I’m longing for a weekend getaway. I’m longing for something different than what I’ve been doing. When I lived in Philly or Memphis, I would take the approach of being a tourist in my own town, and in those places I had people (friends or girlfriends) who might call me up to do things. Here, I avoid town because I don’t want to be surrounded by students and I don’t visit other towns because the drives are longer than I care to make and I anticipate the payoff to be low. So I go to the bar on Thursday and Friday night, I stay in and listen to music on Saturday night, and on Sunday I try to read and write and do chores and look for jobs. Except by Sunday, I didn’t want to do any of those things. After a while (with little progress to show for my efforts), even my routines begin to feel a little too routine.
Ultimately, I decided not to hit publish on yesterday’s post (or the two from last week). Limbo doesn’t last forever. I’ve been in and through these liminal spaces before.