Planning 18

Today’s Song: Short Skirt/Long Jacket by Cake

You know what’s great? Vacations. Vacations are great.

Have you ever read Divergent? No? Well, I recommend it. You can probably borrow it, or I know they have it at the library. You just have to get over the fact that you’d like to read a YA novel, thank you very much, the themes can be quite complex and emotionally striking. But in Divergent (and I’m not spoiling anything that you don’t find out in the first twenty pages or so). they’re in this dystopian future where everyone is broken up into five factions: Abnegation, Amity, Candor, Dauntless, and Erudite. They all have their own traits and what they think is important and what they think is bad, but I really like Abnegation because their thing is selflessness. They wear grey clothes and eat simple food and try not to take up too much space. And I think that’s a lovely thought. It could get mixed in with some other thoughts, but it’s a lovely thought.

Now that I’ve read Divergent, whenever I do something like take a couple of days of vacation or eat out multiple days in a row or, heaven forbid, have more than one beer, I get this guilty feeling that I thought I had left behind me. What makes me think that I can waste my time like that? Entire afternoons spent in front of the TV or absorbed in a book or just listening to music. Who has time for that? There is a world to be saving and I am spending the gifts I have been given sitting on the couch. It’s extraordinarily selfish.

And I know that I shouldn’t feel guilty. I needed this vacation. I wouldn’t be an effective worker or educator if I hadn’t taken some serious downtime this week. And I needed a responsibility break as well. I start to get super preachy when I’m tired and that’s just not something that I need to be doing right now. What I really should be doing is serving where I can, but routine service on my schedule is difficult and motivating myself to go looking for ways that I can help when I’m resting is really a non-starter. There’s just plenty of TV to be watching instead. And anyway, I hate people.

There’s a balance between the self-serving and the self-sacrificing, I know there is. And I know that I should be able to find it. And I should be able to find confidence in what I do and in taking care of myself and in deciding my future. It’s the Adult Scavenger Hunt of Good Qualities and Purpose and I should, in theory, be able to succeed at that. I should be able to walk around with quiet confidence and not have to fake it all the time. I’m done being this chipper giggly person that I think I’ve been the past couple of years, but I don’t know how to put that down. Then again, the giggles have made the scavenger hunt difficult, so it’d be really nice to figure all that out. I’m not sure. That analogy got away from me.

I feel like taking the week off has made my brain fuzzy, but I’m going to do some identity thinking and then make some decisions, and then we’ll call this process done. I think I know what I’m going to do and I have certain webpages bookmarked and some savings earmarked for this application process. I’m going. I’m leaving. I just don’t know where to yet.yout