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June 30, 2000
Dissatisfaction.
So I woke up feeling generally lousy yesterday. Headache, nausea, fatigue... I always feel guilty calling in sick, though, so I got up and went to work. I hoped that maybe getting moving, and plenty of caffiene, would make me feel better. By ten o'clock I was dragging, and feeling worse by the minute, so I went home and had a long nap -- and some very weird dreams. This morning I felt marginally better, but still not well enough to want to go to work. Guilt aside, I knew the library would be dead as a doornail today, so my absence wouldn't be a problem. (Because, you know, the place might burn down if I'm not there...)
So far I've been fairly productive today. My roommate let me borrow her car (oh, if I only had a car...) to go to Bradlee's, to get frames for the posters that have been collecting dust in a corner since I moved in. I also bought hangers and wire to try to hang my mirror on the wall, and I vacuumed, made a huge pitcher of iced tea, played with my poor neglected cat, and cleared away the pile of clothes and junk on the floor. I'm enjoying being a slob lately -- Barry would get annoyed if I so much as left a sock on the floor, so I'm letting my slovenly habits come out again, for a while.
So it's not even noon yet, and I've gotten more done than I would have at work. And I still don't feel well. Go figure.
I'm feeling very restless lately. Dissatisfied with myself. For four years, I had a plan for my life, an identity -- all tied in with one person. I very much enjoyed being a wife -- not a housewife, mind you, but I liked being a partner in a relationship. I loved referring to Barry as my husband. I loved doing the tedious household stuff together -- grocery shopping, cleaning, whatever. All the plans in my head were made with that other person in mind, and with that partnership to rely on. And with all that gone, as melodramatic as it sounds, I don't quite know who I am anymore. I still have the framework of a plan for myself -- finish school, get a job, most likely relocate somewhere cheaper than Boston -- but I still feel aimless.
I always used to be very comfortable with my own company. I was a loner all through school, so I got accustomed to spending a lot of time on my own, and I always liked it. I was just solitary by nature. I seem to have lost that, though. I'm irritable and bored, and my own company just annoys me now. Granted, given the choice I would not want Barry's company again -- I'm just trying to get used to it.
Part of me does not want to share any of myself again. I don't want to be vulnerable, I don't want to let someone in, where they might do more damage. I've never been overly trusting of other people, and I certainly am not inclined to trust people now. Hopefully that will be something I can get past, because I would hate to become more jaded than I already am. But I don't know where to draw the line. How much trust is too much? How much can I share, without losing myself again?
The advice most people have offered me is "Find something you'd like to do, and pursue it.' All well and good. But I don't know what I'd like to do. My therapist suggested I take an adult ed. class, which could be fun -- but it's also expensive. And would take me more courage than I feel like I have right now. The class itself would be fine, it's the meeting new people that worries me. I am a wallflower -- all that time on my own. I don't handle meeting new people terribly well -- I get tongue-tied, and become convinced that they just think I'm a big loser. (An aside, to illustrate the point -- I had maybe two friends in high school. I assumed nobody liked me. About a year after I graduated, I ran into a former classmate, who told me that everyone he knew liked me, but I came across as aloof, and not wanting to talk to anyone. I would give my right arm to go back and change that -- who knows what I would be like now, if I could?)
I intensely dislike this feeling of limbo, of transition. I feel like I'm just waiting for something to happen -- waiting to finish school, waiting for the divorce to be final (which should be very soon, hurrah!). Waiting to figure out what to do with myself now.
Posted by Mary Ellen at June 30, 2000 03:15 PM