Back At It Again; Alt: Who Am I

Well hello there.

It's been about two years.

I stopped for a while. I do this thing where I try to get "famous" and it ruins everything for me. I need to stop trying to be famous. It takes the joy out of it. And what is the point of doing anything unnecessary if there is no joy in it?

But lately I've been at a stand still. I've been going through a huge life change. It's like a mid life crisis except I'm 27. I'm realizing a lot of things about myself that I didn't know before. I'm realizing a lot of things about myself that I thought were true, are false, and a lot of things I thought were false, are true. These narratives I've told myself. And it's good. But after kids and marriage and working from home for 3 years, I feel I need to figure out who I am. And it makes my husband laugh because he knows who I am, but hey, if he could just tell me, then we wouldn't be here.

The one thing I've realized is that I need to write more. I need to write and I need to read and I need to learn and consume art and information that serves me.

A lot of this "who am I" is oriented around what I want to do with my life. I used to be a very busy person. In high school, some nights I'd sleep in a chair in the auditorium because extracurricular activities were stranding me there. This was a rare occurrence, but it did happen. I thrived in that environment. In college I took 22 credit hour semesters, and flourished. And now my time is filled with sweeping, mopping, laundry, throwing away broken toys, and a lot of thinking. It's not all bad. But it doesn't feel like my prime. And I refuse to accept that my prime is over, at the age of 27. So after all of the crumbs have been swept, what will I do?

Here are my thoughts lately.

In no particular order.

I could be a therapist? I've been interested in the way the mind works for some time. My best friend is a phenomenal therapist, and I look up to her and aspire to be like her. My own therapist is so big in my life, and I would love to be that for someone. I'd love to help sort out other's thoughts and while doing so, maybe sort out my own. It would involve more school, which I'm not opposed to, re:I love school. It would involve hours and hours of certification, which may not be ideal. And there's a big unknown of where would I work? Could I find a job? Would it be one that made me satisfied?
And I'm not really a fan of the unknown.

I could be an organizer? Not a cleaning lady. The kind of lady that instagram famous ladies and rich old ladies pay to come in and organize their pantries and closets. I guess there's not the fulfilling aspect here of changing a person's life in the way that therapy or teaching does, but there is the satisfaction of putting someone's home in order, and by doing so, restoring a little more order to a world that really needs it. It's a passion around my house, and I think I'd be good at it. But there is a whole lot of unknown there, and a huge potential of business failure, which comes with the sacrifice of a lot of money and even more time.

I could be a secretary? This one made my husband laugh in shock. I don't mean the kind of secretary in Monster's Inc. I mean the kind of secretary in I Feel Pretty. I literally want the chick flick life secretary job. Joseph said he never imagined me as wanting that kind of job, sitting at a desk and taking calls. And it's not that, that's not what I want to do. I suppose it's just in those movies, they start in that job -- "And they then become owners of the company?" No, Joseph. Sometimes they do. And sometimes they do something else. But the job is the point that they start at, and after the course of 2 hours, they figure out who they are. So being a secretary would help me figure out who I am. I guess maybe real life secretary jobs aren't like that.

Listen, Joe, I don't want to be a secretary at Honeywell (Joe's job)
I want to be a secretary in a big building with glass walls, lots of light, and I can wear lots of suits.
Ah. I see. You want to be a secretary from a chick flick.

Yes. Is that too much to ask?

I could be a gardener? I love plants. I love taking care of them and feeling the soil between my fingers and smelling their leaves. It grounds me. I love walking around under the sun with a watering can and a tiny shovel for pulling leaves. I love talking to people and teaching them that they can indeed be a plant person too, it's just a matter of finding the right plant. You don't walk into a dog shelter and pick out any old dog, you pick out the one that is your other half. And it's the same with plants. I think I'd be quite good at that. But I guess I don't know what all entails working at a garden shop. Maybe it's not all pulling weeds. What else could it be? Anyone else work at a garden shop?

I could be a librarian? My personality tests really pushed this one. A literally quiet job, with a lot of learning. I mean, doesn't everyone want to be a librarian in some way. Burying yourself in walls of books, losing yourself in hallways of stories. Shushing people. Shushing so many people. Anxiety creeps in though. Libraries seem to be places where all kinds of people end up at some point or another, including some of society's worst. I may just have to hire a body guard. And the whole practical aspect of it requiring a master's degree (which isn't the worst) and the jobs are low in number, and prospecting librarians are high in number (which is the worst.)

And then we come back to teaching. Something draws me to it, at the same time that it pushes it away. I feel sort of like maybe teaching is an abusive lover. Or maybe I'm the abusive lover? But we can't stay away from each other, but maybe we're not the best for one another. I crave contact, changing lives, changing the world. But there's no time for such things, as a teacher, anymore. It doesn't help that all elementary school teachers I know are counting down the days to summer from the second the bell rings on the first day of school. And sure there are a lot of moments where it all makes sense. Sprinkled among testing, difficult students, difficult parents, difficult administration, difficult rules. If I could have a one room schoolhouse, in the olden days, that would be great. I'd love my own classroom. Truly my own classroom.

Ah the days of yore.

Well.

I guess that's all. In all of this, I think I need to write more. I think writing really helped me through college in guiding me, and I think it could help me a lot now. So what do you say?