The Human Condition.

I am sitting in a café in New York City. I am unemployed. I am staring out the window with the rain falling outside: I thought I had left the drizzle behind me. My days are empty if you think that working a paying job makes your life full; my days are full if you think having freedom to go where you want, when you want without having a time-line is the essence of living. I wake up, pick the cat hair off of my face as it has usually collected there and stare into the room of the tiny apartment that I am calling my ‘home’—it is a small but useful space with a collection of suitcases and piles of clothes. It has a lived in feeling to it, while still seeming a little vacant. I yearn for that job that I will get someday, and yet I loathe the thought of a job. I don’t understand why this has become such a necessary aspect of being human. A job is a purpose? A purpose is to find a job? To survive one must have money, to have money one must sacrifice time and energy to acquire a job. I want to exist in this world as an active participant, yet, I don’t want to participate in this world of survival=money=job=money=survival. I miss being a small child, innocently unaware of the struggles that we each face within our lives to become a ‘real person’ that person that grows into their dark circles under their eyes, the inherent sagging shoulders on days where your head hangs heavily from your neck…tired of the monotony of life and yet, you do it all to be a part of life. To live. To experience this world.

I don’t know where to go with myself anymore. I don’t mean physically. I get to walk around the greatest city in the world for as long as I want right now. Those usually take me to spots overlooking the city, or viewing the well-known city locations like the Rockefeller center with the ice skating rink, or the NBC studios. (Side note: as I am typing this, they are filming a scene at Aroma Espresso Café for “As the World Turns” right behind me. I think my back could be famous tomorrow…oh New York City.) What I mean is this: What am I doing in this world? Sometimes I think that I should be an attorney like so many people suggest to me…perhaps that is where I could most help others. Something about being attorney just doesn’t appeal to me though, and then I question my selfishness. Am I wasting away my talents and potential by not pursuing a legal career? That is the same question I asked myself when I stopped pursuing a theater major. I have all of these inner struggles with the concept of selfishness. I get overly concerned and then, other times, I completely disregard and that is when I am at my worst I am afraid. Hypersensitive. Cold. What a great dichotomy…These questions and concerns are what prompted me to design the major that I did: an intricate look at identity and self. This is why I think that writing suits me well. I get to ask questions and ponder them. I can just think about these things, read and discuss them and write about what all of this means to me. But, does anyone else really care? I had this grandiose plan that I would start a blog and then hundreds, perhaps thousands of people would read it and I could then know, this is right for me. I am a writer. Unfortunately, rarely do things go as are planned or wished. I can accept that. I know that in life things take time, patience and hard work. It is just hard to be in such a state of transition and having to be okay with not knowing...I'm learning a lot about myself.