i have to go away
This is the first time to myself i feel like i've had since coming back from vacation. It's around 1pm Wednesday and i'm waiting for a burger at a local sports bar. In about an hour i'm meeting a friend to go see Book of Mormon. This is the much-overdue "time in lieu" for all the overtime of a few months ago.
As soon as i got back from vacation everything went down the same hole i was hoping the break would save me from. Within an hour i was fucked up. Back to hating work, getting into the office hungover and miserable. I need to get out. Come the weekend i was so over everything i ignored my phone and email and just lay in bed playing video games and sleeping.
I gotta start planning if i really want to escape this. I have to start selling all my crap, i have to book flights, figure out my money situation... But like i said, same hole. During the week i'm either drunk or exhausted. The weekend is even worse. This is no way to live. I don't want to deal with anyone, i just want to disappear, be an anonymous drifter.
* * *
That was yesterday. Book of Mormon was great, and for a change i managed to avoid stumbling out of the bar after 2am and was safely in bed by midnight. Which is why it's 8pm right now and i'm not getting more fucked up or passing out from exhaustion. I need to capitalize on these moments, i guess. But i'm spent. Got home from work at 7. Another day tomorrow. I am so sick of it all.
Through this there have been two people who have been really supportive: R - who sees my exhaustion and frustration first hand at least once a week at the bar - and my mom, surprisingly. I haven't written her a decent email in months, but just from shreds of Facebook updates and the odd exasperated email she knows exactly where i'm at. And she thinks it's a great idea to just quit and take the time i need to do something for me. She's been doing the same thing the past few months. She quit her job at the beginning of the year, did a road trip across Australia, took up wood-carving lessons and is doing some conservation/environmentalist courses. She has no idea what she's going to do next, but for the first time in years her emails are relaxed and happy. She might not be as much of a fuck-up as i am in her everyday life, but she gets it. How work can wear you down till there is nothing left at all. And honestly, these days, aside from my work, i don't have anything left. I've gotten to the point where i spend almost every moment "self-medicating" or sleeping or struggling to do the most basic chores.
It took me a week after getting back to finish my laundry. I did laundry almost every day on vacation, washing socks or underwear in the hotel sink. I relished it, it was something real. Now it's just another reminder of work looming the next day, and the next, and the next. The worst part is, i really don't have such a bad job - i'm paid six figures to sit on my ass, and the bar is set SO fucking low in my office i literally could just sit on my ass all week and still be considered a model employee... But as usual i have too much pride in what i do; i kill myself trying to fix everything and get more and more frustrated that no one else seems to give a shit. And all the while every cell in my body is crying out to move, to do something else, to be somewhere else. To get the hell away from the inane conversation about babies and houses and family and all the stupid fucking shit i could care less about.
There were a few times on vacation i felt really sad i didn't have someone to share it with. Sometimes i was at a bar and missed my drinking buddies. Sometimes i was at a club and missed my dancing buddies. Here and there i was taking a walk and something struck me emotionally and i missed having someone to talk to about what i was feeling. But not once did i wish i had gone with someone. Because it would've become yet another "compromise" vacation, a trip with a few highlights and a lot of obligation. I was thinking about that yesterday and i realized that although there are times i desperately miss having a partner, i will never be happy with the "standard" relationship where you live together and travel together and pool your belongings and become a family. That's the stuff i've always hated the most. I thought when i got together with J i had it all figured out - a relationship where we were cool to let each other do whatever we wanted, and just hang together when we felt like it. But that doesn't last. Eventually they want more, and then you end up blowing $1200 on a dresser and bedside tables when you were perfectly happy living out of suitcases in the closet. And now my marriage is over and i want to move and that stupid furniture is just another anchor.
Of course it's beautiful. I love beautiful things. It's nice to live in a beautiful house. But "things" have always been what get me stuck. "Things" ultimately make me unhappy. "Things" don't last. All you really have is experiences and memories. And, God help me, if i ever lose those i hope i still have one friend around who'll blow my fucking brains out.
As soon as i got back from vacation everything went down the same hole i was hoping the break would save me from. Within an hour i was fucked up. Back to hating work, getting into the office hungover and miserable. I need to get out. Come the weekend i was so over everything i ignored my phone and email and just lay in bed playing video games and sleeping.
I gotta start planning if i really want to escape this. I have to start selling all my crap, i have to book flights, figure out my money situation... But like i said, same hole. During the week i'm either drunk or exhausted. The weekend is even worse. This is no way to live. I don't want to deal with anyone, i just want to disappear, be an anonymous drifter.
* * *
That was yesterday. Book of Mormon was great, and for a change i managed to avoid stumbling out of the bar after 2am and was safely in bed by midnight. Which is why it's 8pm right now and i'm not getting more fucked up or passing out from exhaustion. I need to capitalize on these moments, i guess. But i'm spent. Got home from work at 7. Another day tomorrow. I am so sick of it all.
Through this there have been two people who have been really supportive: R - who sees my exhaustion and frustration first hand at least once a week at the bar - and my mom, surprisingly. I haven't written her a decent email in months, but just from shreds of Facebook updates and the odd exasperated email she knows exactly where i'm at. And she thinks it's a great idea to just quit and take the time i need to do something for me. She's been doing the same thing the past few months. She quit her job at the beginning of the year, did a road trip across Australia, took up wood-carving lessons and is doing some conservation/environmentalist courses. She has no idea what she's going to do next, but for the first time in years her emails are relaxed and happy. She might not be as much of a fuck-up as i am in her everyday life, but she gets it. How work can wear you down till there is nothing left at all. And honestly, these days, aside from my work, i don't have anything left. I've gotten to the point where i spend almost every moment "self-medicating" or sleeping or struggling to do the most basic chores.
It took me a week after getting back to finish my laundry. I did laundry almost every day on vacation, washing socks or underwear in the hotel sink. I relished it, it was something real. Now it's just another reminder of work looming the next day, and the next, and the next. The worst part is, i really don't have such a bad job - i'm paid six figures to sit on my ass, and the bar is set SO fucking low in my office i literally could just sit on my ass all week and still be considered a model employee... But as usual i have too much pride in what i do; i kill myself trying to fix everything and get more and more frustrated that no one else seems to give a shit. And all the while every cell in my body is crying out to move, to do something else, to be somewhere else. To get the hell away from the inane conversation about babies and houses and family and all the stupid fucking shit i could care less about.
There were a few times on vacation i felt really sad i didn't have someone to share it with. Sometimes i was at a bar and missed my drinking buddies. Sometimes i was at a club and missed my dancing buddies. Here and there i was taking a walk and something struck me emotionally and i missed having someone to talk to about what i was feeling. But not once did i wish i had gone with someone. Because it would've become yet another "compromise" vacation, a trip with a few highlights and a lot of obligation. I was thinking about that yesterday and i realized that although there are times i desperately miss having a partner, i will never be happy with the "standard" relationship where you live together and travel together and pool your belongings and become a family. That's the stuff i've always hated the most. I thought when i got together with J i had it all figured out - a relationship where we were cool to let each other do whatever we wanted, and just hang together when we felt like it. But that doesn't last. Eventually they want more, and then you end up blowing $1200 on a dresser and bedside tables when you were perfectly happy living out of suitcases in the closet. And now my marriage is over and i want to move and that stupid furniture is just another anchor.
Of course it's beautiful. I love beautiful things. It's nice to live in a beautiful house. But "things" have always been what get me stuck. "Things" ultimately make me unhappy. "Things" don't last. All you really have is experiences and memories. And, God help me, if i ever lose those i hope i still have one friend around who'll blow my fucking brains out.