Wiping the Slate Clean

Amidst all of this Internet chaos and moving things around, I’ve also been undergoing some other serious changes. For one, we’ve just moved from a house into an apartment. The new place is very spacious and a friggin’ steal for what we’re paying, but I still have the urge to throw away a lot of things. I’m a minimalist, though you wouldn’t know it from looking at the clutter on my computer desk. I like things to be simple, neat and presentable. I don’t know from whence I picked that one up, given that my dad’s a bit of a packrat and my mom’s probably got mail from a year ago sitting around the house. But while I’m trying to figure out the nicest-looking layout for my furniture and how to best accommodate guests, I’m also throwing out a lot of things from my wardrobe. I’ve discovered I have too many books to fit on the only bookshelf I wanted to save, but I refuse to get rid of books, because I do hang onto the written word like a fiend, even my old high-school literature notes. What? They’ll come in handy someday, just wait and see.

There was a lot of bickering, lots of, “Don’t touch that! I’ll kill you if you break that! Stay the hell away from those, you don’t get to decide what should be important to me!” With all the pressure coming from every side—being told that it would be hard for us to get into an apartment of any kind at all, having the sudden rush near the end to have to get out, downsizing our belongings, forwarding mail in the midst of packages received, a myriad of bills and just the general workload that Joe has every day (and the frustration he brings home with him)—we almost didn’t make it through this as a couple family.

Also, while we can probably make it by with only Joe’s income, I will be needing to go back to work if I want to pay my internet bill, save money for Johnny’s future, maintain some sort of savings and retirement plan, and generally support all of my hobbies and hideouts here on the World Wide Web. That lady from the grocery deli who always asks about the baby when Joe goes to buy meat lives in our apartment complex. Joe is going to ask her if she’ll refer me, if they need people to work at the store. I wouldn’t mind working there, and while it wouldn’t bring in nearly as much as waiting tables, it beats the interaction.

I’ve had a couple nightmares about serving tables, the kind I used to have when I did it on the regular (i.e., I’d dream that I got seated four to seven tables at once and didn’t have anything I needed, or couldn’t find where anything was on the menu, or forgot an order after I didn’t put it in and didn’t have it written down—because I used to do everything from memory). I’ve had a dream where I simply couldn’t handle the pressure and another one where I spaced out uncontrollably when approaching a table and also didn’t know the menu and they got mad and asked for someone else and I quit right there on the spot!

Since becoming a mom, my multi-tasking skills are highly enviable, but my short-term memory is shit! Bleu and I had this conversation last night over AIM: “How am I supposed to juggle a thousand things when I can’t remember where any of them are?”

So yes. Me going back to work = scary. Also, aren’t I supposed to go back to school at some point and finish a degree of some sort? Oh, right—I don’t know what I want to be labeled as for the rest of my life. My mom only used her degree for a short time before having a family, ending up divorced and having to go back to school all over again to be trained for something else while she worked and supported and took care of two kids; my dad has his degree and uses it to teach at the college, but he has like four or more other jobs that don’t even require one (in the same field that he loves; both of my parents got music degrees). I know I should have something to fall back on if the whole authoring thing doesn’t pan out, but there’s nothing out there I want to do. And I find that once you have a degree, it’s still hard to get a job in the field you want, and often it gets put on hold and stuck on the shelf like everything else.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m going to get one. I’m just saying it will probably be something ridiculous like creative writing (which often only gets you the jobs for which you don’t need a degree, since you need a teaching degree to, you know, teach), or something else I will probably not use. People still look more favorably upon those who have them. I think this is unfair and a flaw in our system. It would be helpful if keeping people in school for as long as possible were as beneficial to all as it is to a select few self-motivated students, but with education in its current state, I tend to think that most people are educating themselves. Maybe that’s what we’re supposed to learn with just a little bit of help and guidance, but I already know how to do that. Education is built on networking, on keeping an open mind and an open eye out. University was originally only for the rich who could afford to rub elbows and gain fellowship with those in high-class networks. It was for that very purpose—that’s why fraternities were conceived. Everyone else was born into their professions, recruited by someone who was amazed by their general knowledge of some topic, or chose them based on their natural talent. Poorer people learned by reading, and by listening to those who knew better than they. Why should the C+ student who barely listens, but has a piece of paper and a handful of buddies, get the job I was born to do?

Enough ranting. Since I got into this new place, I’ve been able to spend more time doing enjoyable things (when I’m not trying to get my life in order, be it real or online). We have a pool, which Johnny loves. I have a lovely view and lots of green things outside. Most people want to spend less time in the kitchen, but I feel like experimenting. It feels like home. It’s a good feeling.

I gave the homepage a facelift last night, and I also gave Explosive a facelift. Of course I have some color scheme things to work out with the changed Vineld shrine, and I still have to fill in the archives on the home page and add things to the shrines, but… I like the new image. And I love my new blogging tool. And my bloglines list.

Feels good to start some things over. Fall cleaning!