enfinblue's Bluey (credit to Fifi for the nickname!) Diaryland Diary

"I am seeking, I am striving, I am in it with all my heart." -Vinc3nt V@n Gogh

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Where do I go from here? A positively mournful entry of purplish prose.

Sometimes the yearning for something hits me very hard. It's like pining for a love that's long gone, never to return--you'd do anything to get back to some specific day, to some mundane place where you felt something true relaxedly and comfortably.

The other day and then again yesterday I inadvertently pulled up some references to road races in Sydney, Australia (Sydney Morning Herald H@lf M@rathon, C!ty to Surf). I remembered in each moment what it felt like to be that fit. I remembered what it felt like to run that gut-bustingly hard--into the wind, into the heat, down to the ocean, fighting to the finish with men dead-set on beating me. I remembered owning my body completely: understanding its sinews, its shape. Last night I was curled up in a chair, falling asleep, listening to the rain and I looked down at my body and realized that I no longer trusted it completely. That, if anything, is the first realization of creeping age. I've been wrong about the other signals, I think. I didn't really think this would happen to me, I admit.

I think what I miss right now is not so much running but that feeling of having something to turn to at which I'm genuinely good. I don't mean this as something to wield against others. Rather, I mean that it's difficult for me to face that I'm starting at zero in so many things. It's frightening. I feel lonely, even a bit naked; definitely pathetic and pitiable (though not in a good way). It's like the feeling I had the other night when I watched a homeless guy (the first I've ever seen in this town), pushing a shopping cart in the dark towards the park of the monastery, and swigging on a bottle of something in a paper bag. I didn't want to diminish him by loading my self-reflexive pity on him, but I did in my heart as I passed by, anyhow.

I know that I have quite a bit of training and even experience in a few things. I'm not a great economist, however, and I know this. Not to mention talent, I just don't have the passion required for this.

I have always wanted to draw and paint. I know at least that I have some talent for this. But if I were to try to do this more seriously, I would be starting at the bottom in pursuing training. I am not skillful enough yet to call myself anything.

I'm afraid to be a beginnner at something again. I'm wondering if I still have time to be a beginner--I've tried so many things and changed course so frequently--but then I know that I will not be satisfied until I feel that my passion and my daily converge, comingle, whatever. As cheesy as it sounds, I had that once in my running and I want that feeling of passion meeting prose again. I'd rather be poor and passionate than stable and bored. I'm likely a complete fool and doomed to dark circumstances for thinking this.

I had that feeling when I was sitting in the restaurant at the birthday party last week. It was a lovely dinner--more than $200 a plate, I was told--and I commented that I'd very much enjoyed the heirloom tomato salad and that the seafood had been very nice. And then I said something distractedly like that I rarely go to restaurants. The person next to me (the lady doctor, in fact) and the woman across the table asked me if I was looking forward to being able to do this sort of thing again regularly. The boldfaced truth of it is that I enjoy that sort of thing on very rare occasions, but that I never crave fine dining on my own and would never choose it if left to my own selection. I'm quite happy with beans and bulgur and home cooking and the occasional hole-in-the-wall ethnic cooking. This sounds all good and virtuous and everything but I suspect that it stems from something more pernicious--guilt, hopelessness, perhaps.

I'd like it if someone could snap their fingers and make me into a satisfied person who can simply go forward with the training that she has. I'd like to know that one day I will be settled.

So do I start over again with something new (or partly new--a history thesis and teaching), or do I settle into some sort of an economist trajectory in Ottawa and go from there?

I grow old, I grow old/ I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled/ Shall I part my hair behind?/ Do I dare to eat a peach?/ I shall wear white flannel trousers and walk upon the beach/ I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each/ I do not think that they will sing to me.
Yadda Yadda. TS El1ot. Always right.

I was watching a documentary last night about Tuscany and the artistic and political duels of Sienese and Florentine cathedrals. I never cease to marvel at how people who only lived, say, 40 years could produce such works of refined craftsmanship and staggering genius. I've spent nearly 40 years fussing about my hair.

I had a dream last night. In my dream I had to attend lectures in huge lecture halls that were intended to review everything about each particular subject that I've ever studied. The economics guy was an interesting choice--a macroeconomics guy, not even my field, though a friend. The weird part about it is that I was sitting in the audience of this lecture with a girl from my current program whom I hardly know at all and who I know knows little or no economics. In the dream for some reason I asked her whether she'd received a call about something or other from someone in our current program. She said that she had received a call, but that in fact she thought that it had been from Foreign Affairs. She was thrilled. The girl is actually American and so I asked her if she meant the US foreign service and she said no, that she'd decided to stay here. And in my dream I felt lost again, and my heart sinking.

The stupid thing about the foreign service thing is that it's like pining over a boyfriend whom you know you could probably get back and whom you wouldn't want for long if you did. (My contacts would definitely take me back into the department in Ottawa on contract at least, and then I could join the general competition and try again for a rotational placement.) What it amounts to I realize, however, is that it's mostly about wanting to win every competition, even when the spoils are not something you'd cherish especially, or, more importantly, that would be particularly good for you.

In a way, I think I've been suffering with a an entitlement problem. I always accuse others of this but I realize that my situation is all of my own doing. I can't choose one thing and commit to it, except the thing that hurts me. And if I'm honest my commitment to that hasn't even been what it should have been in the last couple of years.

I guess I'm puzzled by myself because I like to work hard. I have endurance when I value something. Why am I so stupid when it comes to choosing? Why do I keep on thinking that something better is going to come along? Why do I think that doors will continually open for me as I change my mind? Why do I think that people should forgive me for being so wasteful and stupid?

One of the biggest pathologies that I face, I realize, is that I give up on things when I realize their imperfections. I gave up on economics as soon as I realized that I would never be able to solve any meaningful problems. In a way, it's like I start reading a book and then skip to the last few pages to find out how it turns out and am inevitably disappointed. I was like that as a kid, too. I remember going through the whole process in my head of working out that I would grow up, have a few moments--hopefully--with a husband and kids and then would get old, die, rot, turn to dust, etc. The whole universe seemed so indifferent and predictable and I remember that this acknowledgement of purposelessness distressed me terribly. Do other people think about this in their daily lives or do they just push these thoughts away? I realize that some people cope with this with God. But does everyone see the futile end of everything that they pursue and consciously choose to ignore this?

I know that I'm asking really, profoundly stupid questions but I want to know the answers :). Why is it that most people seem to settle on something eventually and I am unable to do this? Ugh. I loathe myself when I am like this. I think the answer--and I may be wrong--is that I should just choose something about which I feel very good, and then see it to the end. Just finishing something, if imperfect, would probably be my liberation.

12:15 p.m. - 2006-06-22

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