Regret.

I always figured when we turned old and grey, and I was permanently fat and you were timeless and beautiful as a fairy tale that we'd play Mr. and Mrs. Claus during the holidays for childrens' homes and the like. You would have been a perfect Mrs. Claus.

Thing a week.

If Johnathan Coulton can do it, then I can too. Between now and the end of the year, once a week, I will write some small bit of fiction in this blog. Whether it's good or bad, it will go here.

With luck this post won't be my first (and last) work of fiction in this blog.

*The Durski portion of the post wants to point out that it's the first work of fiction because I said I would do something and then it never happened. That would also make it the last work of fiction.*

"It's funny 'cause it's a car."
--Timothy Durski

Ok.

Things might just be ok.

Suck days.

Last Tuesday I caught fire. All week after that things broke down left and right. I did get to watch some awesome TV and get to level 80 in World of Warcraft. But those were still small. And today I spent my whole day regretting most of the last 8 years of my life.

Sucks.

What's stopping me?

I thought about that question a lot over the past week or two. I got my GACE scores from the English content exams I took in June. I passed both exams, which qualifies me to teach at a high school level.

Once I got my official scores I looked around for English teacher jobs in high schools. I found three. I started with the one nearest me because the location was convenient. Then I started the mountain of paperwork. Well, internet forms. I'm applying online. Then there was the stuff I HAD to turn in in paper format. That's nearly finished.

But during that time I've had odd feelings about this job. I'm determined to see this one to the end. I will get this job. But sometimes I fret and worry. Teaching is something I've wanted to do since I really got to know myself in college and I found out teaching is something I do well. Thing is, what if it turns out that it's not what I thought it was going to be? Will it still be worth it? Will I still want to do it? Most of my dreams got retired when I started my job at the landscaping company. Now that I'm doing something with those dreams I don't know what to think. I'm scared. I might actually succeed at life and I worry that I'm either going to like it so much I won't know what to do or it'll turn out the exact opposite and the merely retired dreams will be broken like others.

I'm getting in my own way. I don't really have anything to lose other than the testing fee if I sit on these GACE scores. I have a job that supports me so if I don't get this job it's back to status quo. That's it. But I'm sometimes reluctant.

None of this kind of thing used to happen to me. I used to make up my mind to do something and then I would get it done. Now I finish maybe a quarter of what I start. Nothing really impassions me anymore. Maybe I really am broken.

Oddly enough I'm writing about it on here because I can't seem to pick out an available person to talk to about it all.

I just know I want this teaching job. I think I could turn it into a career. When I think about being in the classroom I feel just a tiny bit like my old self again.

Nothing is going to stop me from getting this job. Not even myself.

The switch is flipped.

Over the last weekend I experienced a weekend of dorkiness unlike any I have seen in a long time. It was all DnD and video games. In jokes happened all the time. The Mountain Dew was everywhere.

I saw someone very dear to me who I hurt very badly. That hurt me pretty badly too. But we talked! We got along! We laughed. It hurt, but it was still very good.

I even went to church and that was good.

Earlier this week I was working and eyes in the distance, head in the clouds. Then like a shot there was a thought: I'm actually satisfied with my life. I like my job. It's great. It's not thrilling and I'm almost always sore, tired, hungry, or all three at once. But I'm having a good time on the job.

At home things are great. Patrick and I are getting along well. We keep thing low key, the food is always good. On nights when I find myself a lone in the house I entrench myself on the futon and watch Scrubs until I can't do much more than nod off towards sleep.

I am also getting into shape. Besides the work out I get on the job, I'm running 3 times a week and doing ab exercises 5 days a week.

There's not a whole lot I would consider to be a big improvement. Maybe if the day were 30 hours rather than 24, I would sleep another 4 hours, eat another hour, and spend the rest playing video games.

Right now I just like living. I have no long term goals aside from the elimination of all my debt. The completion of a day is more satisfying than I can remember in a very long time. It's good.

In the future things will develop naturally, I think. I'm not in the mood to go hunting for anything. So I'm going to spend my February doing nothing and I fully intend to enjoy every last second.

:)

New Year Introspection.

I stopped tonight to think about my life over the past year. I sat in that deep, solemn quiet. Blanketed by cold, my insides matched the outside when I came to a startling realization over what I was so deeply pondering about my life.

I was pondering nothing. I looked out over the past year and there was nothing. Not the good nothing. I have nothing to show for the year. I have one job I have held for four weeks. Not that impressive, but still very good. Aside from one abysmal mistake and the loss of the one thing in the world that was most important to me, I have nothing to show for my year. At all.