New Year; Old Problems

It’s January.

Can I just say, “Holy Hell, how did this happen?!?”

Wasn’t it just November yesterday?

I really thought I would have found a new job by January. That was kind of the plan in my head even if I hadn’t set it in stone.

And while I looked and applied some yesterday, there isn’t a lot out there in the area that won’t just end up being “second verse, same as the first.”

I’d rather not spend effort training to do a job that has as much to do with anything I care about as this one (which is negligible).

But I also really hate my job.

I am feeling so creatively blocked.

Do you know it’s been three years at least since I’ve been in a play?

Sure, I’ve done some workshops while in graduate school, but that’s too long for me.

I really need a creative outlet – crocheting and sewing aren’t cutting it anymore.

Maybe writing this blog isn’t even cutting it anymore.

There is some community theatre around, but it’s all mainstream and musicals from what I can tell. I want to create new work or do challenging pieces, and I don’t know that there’s much of that in town outside of the University.

I just want to feel that I’m using my brain or my heart or my creativity at all.

And I don’t at work.

I feel like my life is ticking by. How has it already been almost eight months since I graduated?

And what have I accomplished?

I suppose living on my own for real and holding down a full time job for the first time is something, but I feel like I’m running in place.

I want to move forward.

But I don’t know how.

I get a sinking feeling in my chest every time the thought crosses my mind that maybe the job I have is the best job I can get.

Around here, it just might be.

I need to get out of here. That much is clear.

But to where? And doing what?

Those are questions I don’t know the answer to yet.

In other news, the D&D group I play with Monday nights has started playing Chore Wars. (http://www.chorewars.com) And getting XP for things like doing the dishes and feeding the cat makes the daily drudgery feel a little more exciting and useful. Plus, the competition and the fact that other people will be able to see if I don’t brush my teeth or clean the litterbox might actually keep me honest and the apartment a little bit cleaner.

But I really need to figure out the next step.

Yesterday.

And I could use all the help I can get in figuring out what that is.

A Fork in the Road

Sometimes procrastination isn’t an end in itself. Sometimes it takes some time to realize why we’re putting off something in particular. Take, for example, my license. I’ve been in Texas two years now for graduate school and planning to stay for another year to save up money before I move and develop more long-term plans. Only my driver’s license expires on my birthday this August – and on a Sunday no less. I was waiting to worry about it until after I graduated, but now it’s been almost two months and I just now got around to calling the DMV to check about renewing my license in the mail. It would seem logical to just switch my license to a Texas one – then there’s no need to buy a plane ticket and attempt to justify to the government how I still live with my parents (which I don’t, really).

But the thing is, I’m not from Texas and don’t want to be. It’s the same reason I haven’t gotten a new cell phone plan when my AT&T plan is much more expensive than some of the other plans which are not available in West Virginia. Having an out-of-state driver’s license and license plate on my car and cell phone number make it clear to others that I’m “not from around here.” And I like it that way. While I’ve met some good people in Texas, the culture overall isn’t one I identify with by any means or would like to be associated with. I certainly don’t want anyone to mistake me for a native – though assumptions like that still happen from time to time. But when they do, I have my proof of the truth – that I’m just a visitor.

And I know it makes no sense to be willing to live in Texas for another year while I still attempt to maintain my distance from it. But it’s there. My heritage lies elsewhere and I want to hold onto that part of me that’s from the North. And I don’t think I’ll lose it if I have to get a Texas driver’s license. But that legal shift would make it seem like this change is more permanent somehow. This was supposed to be temporary and I don’t want to end up stuck here forever because it’s easier not to leave. There’s a part of me that doesn’t want anything to tie me to Texas. My friends would, surely, but many of them will come and go as well.

Maybe it doesn’t have to make sense. Emotions are rarely rational. So my options stand: 1) Find a suitable letter of explanation to defend why I cannot come to the DMV office in person in August to renew my license and renew it through the mail; 2) wait until Christmas to renew since I have a six month grace period and hope that I don’t get a ticket; 3) put on my big girl panties, suck it up, and go switch my driver’s license to a Texas one.

In this summer of flux when I don’t know where I’m headed or how the future’s going to turn out, there’s a part of me that’s resisting settling down here. I am still waiting to hear about a better job and while I know it makes no sense to spend all my savings moving, there’s a part of me that never would have imagined I’d ever be here – much less staying after I graduate. I came to Texas kicking and screaming and I’m not ready to give up my last legal ties to the hill country of my birth. Maybe I just have to be secure enough in my identity to know that I’m not a Texan, even if I might look like one to others.