And now I have returned from my two-week visit with my family. I’m back!
I took a break from everything and did nothing. I spent quite a bit of time with family members, which is partially why I didn’t update during the holiday vacation. Another reason? I’m still anonymous, and with my family I can never be alone in a room. Now one of my good friends is in town (in fact, she owns the house I live in), so I won’t be doing much updating this week except for this post. Besides the fact that we want to hang out, I also want to keep this blog secret from her as well as my family.
This is where I feel like a coward with my excessive paranoia. Why can’t I even venture onto these blogs for a few minutes because I don’t want others to see what I’m doing? Why am I so secretive? Today when I was at work, I had to spend the first hour on a computer lab computer because the maintenance people were working near my space. Since there were no students, that was fine. But every time someone would walk somewhere behind me, I’d feel tense and dread the possibility of them looking to see what was on my screen. And I wasn’t even doing anything wrong! I was strictly doing my job.
Moving on then. While I’ve been gone, halfwaybetweenthegutter has nominated me for a Versatile Blogger Award! Thanks are due! I will post my own response in a few days, on either Friday or Saturday. (Again, there’s my paranoia to consider.) I would like to think carefully about what I’d like to mention and which blogs to nominate. (There are many excellent blogs out there!) This weekend, I’ll also try to catch up on others’ blogs.
And now we finally reach the title of my blog. An extensive discussion of what I did during the holidays would bore anyone to death. A familiar phenomenon happened: I lounged around the house, read, and watched TV. I slept late. At one point, I began to get stir crazy because I was doing nothing. Then I settled into the routine of doing nothing and grew accustomed to it. I enjoyed it. It was like I was living in this blissful vacuum. I worried about nothing and did whatever I wanted. I was lazy. But the bubble had to burst some time. When it came to an end, I didn’t know if I could return to the real world. I grew morose. Going back to work today was difficult. Just having to be present around other human beings filled me with panic.
This doesn’t happen to most people I know. They say that they’re actually glad to be back at work because they became extremely bored doing nothing. But not me–I want to live in the nothingness bubble forever.
What ever happened to my work ethic? My ambition? Am I such a useless human being that my life’s desire is to do nothing?
That’s the trick. Anyone who says they’d rather be at work is only giving you half the picture. The other half either contains their disdain for their families / lives or their necessity for the carrot on the stick. Either way, it’s not as good as it seems.
I don’t think you are alone in this. I had a week and a half off of work, and I was called back a day early. I was not looking forward to going back for a vast number of reasons. Even today, my second day back, I’m having panic attacks on the bus about it. Why am I afraid to go to work?! My brain is inventing reasons, because I didn’t prepare for this transition.
I get nervous at work too. I always feel like I’m doing something wrong in the eyes of authority. It doesn’t matter if I’m doing right. I have to do everything I can to keep that under wraps – people sniff it and prey on the vulnerability. I try to look leisurely, but focused. Not too serious. Indifference is best, because it throws people. “What? You don’t care?” And then, they can’t figure out where to grab me.
As for ambition, can you say that you aren’t ambitious about anything? Or is there a block? That’s what you have to determine. Real indifference to avoidance.
I am sort of ambitious about my writing, but lazy when it comes to actually doing it. Otherwise, I feel like my ambition is blocked. I have no idea what I want to do, and I feel as if I am living suspended in the present. And I’m sort of indifferent about the matter even though my rational side is panicking about it.
I like to be mentally prepared in advance, too. As I discovered recently, though, I’m not very good at associating with people. I just realized how odd it is that the only people I know where I work are those in my immediate vicinity. As I was put into an environment with all of those other people, I started trembling and made what I hoped was an unobtrusive escape.
I completely identify with the paranoia about anyone seeing my screen when I’m on the computer/looking at what I have written. Only my boyfriend knows that I blog, and he doesn’t read it – and no one else I care about even knows. I think part of me is terrified to let them see the thoughts and feelings I write about that hide behind my happy facade.
I haven’t told anyone I know that this blog exists. I’m afraid that if people know the sorts of thoughts I have, they wouldn’t want to talk to me anymore. It’s nice to know that you can relate to what I’m talking about.