Today, I have felt the fall chill.
It's coming to the end of summer. Start of September, you know the drill. Except, except, this year it's different. This year, for the first time in eighteen years, I will not be going back to full time education. This year, for the first time in over twenty-two years, I have no planned out path for my immediate future.
It scares the hell out of me.
The apples are ripe, the plums are red and when it rains, it spits, it showers, it pours but it doesn't stop. It's autumn, as far as the weather goes and the garden grows: the temperatures have dropped below twenty degrees and the night draws in before 9pm. As of this week, all of my closest friends, in both senses of the word, live and/or work at least 45 minutes' drive away from me. I don’t have a car. I don’t have a career.
So. What now?
It’s coming to the end of the summer, which involves coming to terms with the fact that I’m not going back to university, therefore I need to figure out what else I can do. In a sort of halfway house, I'm drifting at the moment, slowly, slowly, but I'm hoping things will slot into place, in time. There's always time. So, as I come to the end of a chapter, here's to turning over a new leaf.
I can't say I'm a great fan of this whole "non-student" deal.
On the jukebox: Alexi Murdoch ~ Blue Mind
Hah, the first think thought when I woke up was "Oh god, it's September." I can't pretend the summer is still here and I don't have much to do anymore.
ReplyDeleteThe 'non-'student' deal is great if you're a proper adult. Y'know with a job and a home of your own and a stable relationship.
Do stuff, find things to fill your time and before you know it you'll be sailing along careless and free.
I still love Autumn.
Great new theme :-)
YAAYBLOG.
ReplyDeleteAhem.
You are still putting up your own obstacles, Flixer. Every second you spend fretting about what you can do, what you should be doing and especially should have done by now, is a second wasted that you could be moving to rectify the situation.
It's a daunting time, but you have a lot of it. You aren't in Logan's Run. So turn over a new leaf and stop blocking your progress with what you should have done and what you can't do and find out what you can do, there's going to be so many more things in that area.
If you're at a loss for what to do focus on what you've said here that's making you sad. Your last close friend has moved too far away to walk, but it's a drive away, so find something - anything - to earn money towards (lessons? and) a car. While you're in that anything you can find out about work that's more towards what you want to do, and if you don't know that yet you'll have income while you work that out.
Easier said than done, I know, but even if it's not job-related, do something other than pull your hair out wondering what to do. I want this new leaf you turn over to be one which doesn't invite necessary stress, life throws enough of that at you as it is!
PS: when I say find something to do, it does not include less blogging :-p
lol. necessary stress! ahem. I think you know there's an 'un' missing there,
ReplyDeleteSo perhaps you can't find a job now, or you don't know what you want to do long-term, so you can't even really start looking for a 'real' job, but there are other things in life which are worth doing and working towards and all the rest of it. I've had quite a productive summer learning to drive and working behind a bar and knitting and things. Set yourself targets - like Phill said, aim, say, to get a car (and learn to drive it if needs be). Or aim to run a marathon or learn a language or take up yoga or redecorate your room or run an allotment or something. Join a choir or a bookclub, start volunteering. I've got so much more, this year, out of all the 'peripheral' things I've done with my life - the societies, the skills, the work - than I have out of my degree and work placements and such. Yes, ideally, you'd be out there being a real grown-up with your own life and your own place and in a city with the world buzzing around you, but - well. A said to me recently, 'Jenny, you've got two problems: one, you still have no self-esteem, and two, you still act as if you're a thing to whom life happens, and not as if you have any choice'. The latter really struck home. So go out there and take the world on in any arena you choose.
ReplyDeleteI'm only saying this because in many ways - unless I'm completely missing the point - I do know exactly how you feel.
xxx
On the bright side. You have a cat lying halfway up the stairs who is just waiting to trip someone up for comedy value. So you know, swings and roundabouts.
ReplyDeleteFlippant, moi?
(It sucks, one day it will suck less.)
The theme is too bright and cheerful. It doesn't reflect you fully ;)
ReplyDeleteNo more education. Just don't turn out like moi, mmkay? You need to have some idea in your head what you want to do, otherwise you'll just wander aimlessly. You don't need me to tell you that. Shit, you tell ME that. I think you have an idea though - you're too well-adjusted (...in some ways, at any rate). Besides, you're working currently; regardless of the direction you're going for that's more than I ever did back then. Not that I liked being around people. Ewww... people.
I don't have a car or drive either. NO CAR OR DRIVING BUDDIES FOREVAH. I suppose unlike you I tended to then just not bother with my far-away friends. That was... healthy.
THE crappiest ice cream van music is playing outside. It sounds like the van has been in a terrible accident or something. Also, somebody died across the street yesterday.
Pleased I did this comment? Surely.
But no homework. Just keep remembering that. No homework. It gets better. Trust me. Or don't. I don't know that much.
ReplyDeleteWrite something. Anything. A 'hello'. A ditty. A limmerick. A nonsense poem. Tell me what you had for afternoon tea at the Ritz. Something.
ReplyDeleteAgreed. It's more than time for a new entry.
ReplyDeleteAnd you should listen to Teacherface. Her face teaches.
All I have to say at the moment is in a similar vein to this entry: "this sucks but sometimes it's okay and hopefully one day it'll suck less" so maybe I'll write someday soon, like now, but it's easy to say nothing when there's nothing to say. (It's also easy to say too much when there's not a lot to say, but that's a different matter)
ReplyDeleteP.S. Hello, and thank you for the comments. Sometimes you just need to log on at 6am and see those, you know? I had carrot and coriander soup for lunch yesterday. It was good. STMTM.
Ha, I was just told that "this message looks very suspicious", so there you have it - I write like a spammer. Cheers, compbot, you don't want me to even comment on my own blog...
ReplyDeleteNothing to say for over a month?
ReplyDeleteI disagree. Fuuuuuuriously!
See above. The situation hasn't changed.
ReplyDeleteJust read from here and pretend I wrote it this year.
:P
Haha, I like how everybody else has given advice. I have none, but what I do have is empathy. Where are we going?
ReplyDelete