Hobbling forward

Reentering American society is a long, quiet and private war. I'm often asked what I do with my days and I'm routinely unsure how to answer. Some days I reach epiphanies that clearly steer my decisions, other days I do a lot of thinking with absolutely no conclusions drawn. I've been unemployed for nearly two months now. People keep asking if I've submitted my resume or found any good job listings... if I'm moving in the direction of honoring the Protestant Work Ethic like all 'good' people do. I confess, I think there is goodness in a hard day's work and I hope to return to it soon. It's just that... returning is exactly what I'm avoiding.

There's a trap we returnees are faced with: return to the comfort of what you knew or suck up more of the unknown, and possibly hardship, and do something different. The first of these options is easy to do. In addition to the experiences of the past, we have now served as 'good' people in a 'good' cause and, gosh darn people want to like us for it... and what's so wrong with being liked? The problem is that people don't flee a rewarding life to live in poverty for two years, no matter how open-hearted they are. Something's missing or, perhaps, too much is there and so departure - however temporary - seems like a good solution. Of course, this is until it's time to return when you know you've done little more than fight strange diseases in the name of procrastination.

As I tiptoe into my 30s with intense moisturizer in hand, I look around and see a lot of desperate romances. Of course these include actual intimate relationships, but it also includes attachments people have to other crutches in their lives... 'solutions.' There's a yearning to have The Answer and to look to someone or something else to give it. (I've had a draft of a long entry on addictions for some time... I need to finish it, because it really fits here.) Again, it's about ease - about being able to blame outside of oneself when things go awry, and they will. We all need to live our own truths - we can't depend upon others to provide those, or distract from their omnipresence.

I mention these desperate romances because, I don't want to fall into that trap. The trap of being something I'm not just because it's easy or because people like me for it. I didn't leave hoping for someone else to provide solutions for me and I do not return (I hope) wanting them either. I read my resume, on it's 274th draft, and think that I can and have done all those things. Then I think "do I want to?" ...and the resume sits there. I'm not sure that I do and not sure what to do next to provide for myself while I build something more real and closer to my personal truth. Love. Truth. Courage... hard to live up to.

I've been looking through employment listings like a desperate single woman with the Sunday Styles section (it's wedding listings, for those not in love with NYT.... and that's New York Times). I read about a prestigious consultancy firm with a large Chicago office that does a lot of international work. Like a lot of woman (and, dear lord, far too many gay men), I started to plan the future and to become seduced by the strongest venom of all: potential (as opposed to, oh, reality). I could picture a financially secure life where I went to work with talented and smart people, I traveled for work and for play and I live comfortably ever after. Comfort... not something I realistically ever really like. When thinking more about the position and attempting to deconstruct the fantasy I'd quickly created, I thought of my 10 year high school reunion. I missed part of the reunion and asked a friend about a former classmate of ours that I'd missed. She described the classmate as controlled and clipped... too polished to be real. Do I want to become that?

If asked how I see myself, I'd first attempt to wiggle out of a straight answer and then submit to the following: an observer and analyzer of human nature and interactions. That, unfortunately, is still all too vague. Should I "lead and coordinate cross-functional teams" until I realize what that specifically means to me... or bank on skills related to my drive and see where it goes? I struggle with wondering how to start what I love without nestling into the comforts of old patterns... how to lean on those old talents for support without reintroducing the crutch of yesteryear's answers into my life.