If I wasn't confused on a regular basis, I don't know just what I'd be

This past week has felt like everything is tilting off its axis. July is a very busy month for me, but I seem to forget that each year and go into the month thinking it will be no big deal, then it hits me out of left field and often knocks me on my ample posterior. This year has been no exception, but at nearly the half-way point in the month, I’m still keeping my head above water. Mostly. It just doesn’t always feel that way. Soon July will bleed into August and then my vacation arrives and almost immediately after that, a new season of recruitment arrives and the games begin again. Yeah, I think there’s some relaxation in there…if I ever learn how to relax, that is. I never have been good at that.

 

I’ve seen the movie “You’ve Got Mail” too many times and certain scenes and lines always stick with me. This one in particular:

“Sometimes I wonder about my life. I lead a small life. Well, not small, but valuable. And sometimes I wonder, do I do it because I like it, or because I haven't been brave? So much of what I see reminds me of something I read in a book, when shouldn't it be the other way around? I don't really want an answer. I just want to send this cosmic question out into the void. So good night, dear void!” Kathleen Kelly (You've Got mail)

I don’t necessarily think I lead a small life, but I also don’t think I lead a big one. I get up and go to work and do my thing, but I’m not moving mountains or doing anything earthshattering. It’s what I do and how I pay the bills and then I move on. But sometimes I wonder, as stated above, do I do it because I like it or because I haven’t been brave?

And blech to that word, “brave”. Perspective is an interesting thing and if you asked some people, they might say that I’ve been brave. If there is anything I’ve ever done that seems “brave”, then it was done because I felt like I had no other option. That the action I was about to take was the only road I could possibly travel down. But if you ask me if I’ve been brave, I’ll look at you funny and go back to work. I’m just living my life. I never feel brave. I’m not even sure how one would.

 

I don’t talk to God as much as I used to and when I do, it tends to be a one-sided conversation. All about me. That doesn’t seem the way to go, but when I ask God for answers, he never seems to respond. I continue to wonder why certain things happen. Why people behave the way that they do. Why horrible things happen. Why this. Why that. Why the other. Maybe I think too much. I talk too much, of that I am absolutely confident, but I’ve always been that way. I talked fast and loud as a kid. Maybe it was because if I didn’t, then no one would listen. Nothing makes me crazier than when someone cuts me off mid-sentence. If they’d just let me finish a thought then I wouldn’t talk as much because I’d get it out of my system. Makes sense to me.

 

Sometimes I don't feel like I live in my apartment. I walk around it. I function in it. But I'm not sure I live there. It's sort of like the living room in the house I used to own. Every now and then I'd go in there and sit. Nothing more. Just sit and look around and wonder who lived there. My things were there. I recognized everything around me, but I never lived in that living room. I went in there to dust and that's about it.

 

That's how I often feel in my apartment. I recognize the things around me as my personal belongings, but I don't always feel like I belong there. I spend most of my time in the bedroom and it's rare to find myself in the den, actually sitting on the couch. I sleep in my apartment. I cook there and sometimes eat there (there’s a whole other thing here about how I eat way too many meals at my desk in my office), but I’m not sure I feel like I live there.

 

I don’t love to exercise, but my body does. It’s my brain that has the trouble with motivation, but my body loves the way it feels after I’ve worked the muscles hard. And my brain does like the end result of feeling better (and yes, looking better) than I used to.

 

Oh this week, the end cannot come too quickly. Too many disjointed thoughts and feelings and nowhere exactly right to put them. Like having pieces leftover when you finish a puzzle. Just what are you supposed to do with them? Damned if I know.