Three thoughts, part three

Dec 15, 2016 00:13

I called the package sorting job a firebreak. Certain worries of the past, much of the career failure baggage from the past ten years can burn and burn, but they won't cross over. I might have been wrong, though. At the very least, I was wrong about its completeness. The sense of refuge I mentioned began to crack today. As I shifted, flipped, and shoved boxes, I found myself worrying about my parents.

I know my dad is stressed out about finances. I know he asks why he has had to keep working, when he could have retired five years ago. I know he is stressed about having to pay several hundred for my student loans, when I never graduated from everywhere. I know frustrated with my brother and my progress in our lives. I know he asks himself what he did wrong as a father, and why we are unsuccessful, when the children of the people he knows have respectable careers, families, other achievements.

I don't share my father's perspective, or his values. But I can respect the things he finds valuable, and acknowledge his disappointments and his pain.

So how would I be able to tell him, with things strained as they are, that I am not interested in a career--any career, really? How could it possibly help to explain that a career doesn't look like a future to me? I don't think most of most of my friends would get that. How would that not come across as misguided, ungrateful, self-absorbed, and just plain wrong? I don't think I've accomplished anything in my life that would convince either of my parents--or most of the people I know--that I could be right about this at all.

I feel better when we drive over to the hub. For a while, I get extra shielding from these worries. We have a job to do, a tough, tiring job. But I am good at what I do, and the people who work with me are grateful. I am not face to face with reminders that there is work undone, that things are physically falling into disrepair.

The packages come down the conveyor belt. Even if I don't pick everything that is supposed to go down the chute, I move fast, and make a difference down the line. They keep asking me if I could stay for the night sort as well, and are disappointed when I decline. You're a good worker, and we could really use your help, they say.

Heavy flows block out other thoughts--it's move swiftly, pay attention, or miss the ten, twenty packages coming down the line, sometimes piled on top of each other.

But during the light flows, if I can't think of anything to talk about with my counterpart, I just think to myself. And the worries from outside creep in.

The third thought I had that day: you cannot simply exit.

There are no clean breaks or perfect transitions in life. There is no such thing as truly starting over. There will always be baggage you carry with you.

Picking packages off of the belt is tiring. My knees ache, my fingers ache. I refilled my one liter Nalgene during the ten minute break, but now it's empty again. I'm sweating it all out. My eyes, still darting around from label to label, feel weary. When the upside down tote box marking the end of the sort comes around the bend on the belt--what a relief. I was eager to leave behind home and its worries. But at the end of the shift, I am tired and eager to return.

Maybe a firebreak can stop the wildfire from spreading to your side. But eventually, you have to leave the sanctuary. You must cross over to the burned out remnants of the forest, to see what has changed, and what is still alive.

work, family, little-philosophies, worrying

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