Crushing Krisis

Comic Books, Drag Race, & Life in New Zealand

adulthood

I Need More Morals

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Sometimes i am completely capable of doing something right even when i am sure that i’m not.

Our wireless network was all sorta of wonky. Elise’s laptop was connecting with a wire, her desktop’s connection was dotty, and my computer suddently disconnected from the network every time i checked my imap email. Taken singly the problems might have seemed surmountable, but not all at once. Feeling utterly helpless, i disconnected the wireless modem last night and made no attempt to fix it.

Fast forward a little over 24 hours, and i have a hankering to check my email. I could just plug into the wired connection… if i wanted to be a fucking wuss. But, no. This is simple consumer technology. The only thing standing in my way are three separate operating systems. Everything else is a matter of logic. In some instances logic and instructions written primarily in German. So, mostly logic.

To make a long story short, an hour later here i am posting wirelessly once again. I could be doing the same thing from either of Elise’s computers if i felt like it. Was it simple? No. Did i break and mistakenly delete things along the way? Of course. But i figured out the problem my damn self.

Between this, riding my bike to work, crashing my bike and not dying, subsequently exchanging my bike with no argument, throwing a successful wine & cheese party (wait, i’ll get to that one), and not going to the ER despite being convinced i had broken my hand (although i most certainly hadn’t) i have had a very capable seven days.

Moral which i already knew: you can’t succeed at what you don’t try. Time to employ moral: Seven days down, lifetime to go.

All We Owe, We Owe Her

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Work was as productive today as work can be with Ace of Base’s hit single “Don’t Turn Around” lodged in your brain for eight hours.

My title changed as of yesterday to better represent the incredibly intangible, incredibly invaluable project management service i continue to provide for our company. What’s funny is that i thought my job change would actually reduce the ridiculously large scope of my projects by honing my attention onto more specific, more completeable projects. In fact, I’ve actually tripled my scope just in the last day, and it looks like tomorrow will add some more scope to the pile.

In the wake of the change, i am left wondering if I love what I do. I loved what i did when I started this job, and i still love what my department does. But, do i really love being a project coordinator?

Regardless of the answer to that question, i definitely stopped loving what i was doing sometime between Autumn and Spring. Everything about my job and the people i did it for became twisted so that it was completely unrecognizable. Suddenly, work became the null-time that it is for too many of my co-workers – nothing remarkable or exciting or energizing. i liked what i was doing, but not the reasons i was being made to do it.

Now that’s all been resolved, and i’m doing project management for good, healthy reasons – and learning more about it every day. And, i do enjoy project management – it’s something i have a natural bent towards, to an extent. Yet, it’s so far removed from what i went to school for, and what i came here intending to do, that i am beginning to wonder if i’ll ever love it the way i want to love a job.

What am I interested in anyway?

Nostalgia Attached

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Packing always makes me feel like blogging, perhaps because my first week of blogging featured ongoing packing.

Packing for me is never just about putting things into boxes. It is about reviewing, reflecting, and reconsolidating. Boxing my CD collection goes fast (four boxes, now), desk stuff slightly slower. Slower still is looking through a box of “peter papers” to see if anything can be disposed of yet. Nothing can be, of course, but i take the opportunity to reread almost everything inside.

At the bottom, wedged beneath a battered purple binder containing a hand-scrawled short story that only Gina has read, is a summary of a day of media-deprivation i did for my first class with Ron Bishop. My sentences are sprawling and glib (a clear precursor to this diarrheal exercise), and reading through their words to their naiveté is pure nostalgia.

I was tempted to throw this paper out, as it was just a glorified diary, but something i say in the conclusion stopped me. Feeling as though all intrusive messaging had been flushed from me at the end of my media deprivation day, i apparently sat down to write a song.

Attached to the back of my paper, for Ron’s perusal, is what had to have been the first ever printed copy of “Under My Skin.” He might have even been the first person to read the lyrics.

Amazing. So, yeah, i’m keeping that paper, and all of Ron’s wry comments therein.

Somehow, this move feels as if it’s already over. Maybe that’s too much faith to have when my solution to every problem so far has just to throw money at things, but the idea of moving into an entire house where Elise and I rule every room and closet is just too tingly and wonderful to be diluted with any anxiety about the move itself.

I keep saying that we’re moving to a house, and i keep wishing that we were buying it instead of renting it. All in good time, though.

I Thought Wrong

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I thought … A few weeks between the end of school and the beginning of work… sounds like a life of leisure!

Little did i know.

I don’t think i’ve had five minutes of downtime so far, and the closest i’ve come to leisure is drilling the top harmony part of “Granted” for half an hour while Elise watched in bemusement. None of the dozens of CD reviews or decadent acappella arrangements i had been planning. Half of the friendly get-togethers i had scheduled. Plenty of lifting things i did not know i could lift two weeks ago, and subsequent showers.

I am determined that this is our adult apartment. We will have adult things. We will organize things in an adult way. I bought a very adult tooth brush holder at BB&B that’s a perfect blend of stainless steel and imitation porcelain, and it gives me a little thrill every time i walk past the bathroom door.

Every time i think we are settled i unsettle something. The new taller-than-us bookcase upset multiple neatly packed boxes. The router had me dragging computer parts around the room in circles. The front door is currently barricaded with hundreds of dollars of unbuilt IKEA furniture, necessitating shuffling of ladders and shopvacs in the kitchen.

I love it. The first space i have a complete command over. And no television. And now DSL! And a toothbrush holder! I am nearing the pinnacle of delight.

Now if i could only find five minutes to enjoy it.

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Aim refused to get drunk before our interminable night class on Monday, so instead we stuffed ourselves silly with bubble tea and made a list of think I could do in June.

1. Graduate; get a job in Philly. Pros include staying in the same physical area with the same social network, which incurs lower cost and promotes mental stability. Cons include feeling as though i’m starring in my own personal version of The Truman Show or, alternately, reminding myself how pathetic my life is on a weekly basis. (Note: Cons do not apply if employed by the University of Pennsylvania or Philadelphia Magazine)

2)Graduate; get a job away from Philly. Includes the major benefit of living independently somewhere other than here. Detractions include lack of startup capital, moving all of my stuff, having to buy a car, and the fact that I don’t think my dozen closest friends are going to set-up a schedule where at least one of them is crashing on my couch at all times. At least, not without some prompting.

3)Graduate; attend grad school. Combines academic challenge with possible relocation. My already-existing student loans and the fact that the letters G, R, & E often induce a panic attack are definite detractions, as is the fact that i’d rather gnaw my arm off than go to class lately. (Note: Detraction #2 is waved if I pull a Martha).

4)Graduate; go abroad to do something worthwhile. Pros include buying a backpack guitar and getting a new passport photo. Oh, and changing the rest of thr world a little bit while potentially padding my resume. Cons include putting the rest of my life on hold for a year, airfare, immunizations, the fact that I barely speak anything other than English, and paying hiked-up import prices for new records.

5)Graduate; become a Rock Star. I know that almost everyone wants to be famous but, lets face it, most people have no particular reason to get famous no matter how much they want to be. I used to be most people; in high school i had a recurring fantasy invoked while singing in the shower. It involved me singing in the shower (wait for it…) only to be interrupted by an astute questions posed by my interviewer from Rolling Stone, who i had permitted to join me in the bathroom to facilitate his interview but promptly forgotten once faced with my audience/shower-fixtures. I could conceivably make this a reality. Pros to this include the fact that there’s really no reason for me not to be famous – i’ve got decent songs, a decent voice, and am decently cute (which is more than i can say of any new band i’ve heard/seen within the last month). Cons include that since becoming a rock star is not a definable career choice, and i can’t obtain job security or a future through attempting it, i have relegated it to a back burner for over half a decade so that it’s never really close to reality. Also, it’s a lot of hard work, and schlepping around with my guitar, and believing in myself.

This is what i do while i’m supposed to be blogging, if there is such a time of day. Feel free to share your opinions, additional pros and cons, or alternate options.

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