Alien

I love my son. We spend evenings traipsing home from school/work on the train and then the bus… often stopping for rice and beans or a quick party with our favorite street musicians. He’s starting to converse, even semi-abstractly, and I love spending him-centered time. Last night, as we were walking away from a semi-smelly but oh-so-talented bucket drummer who had given M a pair of light-up sticks and his own bucket for a while, I said, "Did you get to see the drummer?!" And he said, all proudly, "I AM drummer!"

And this is why I hate that I spend 40 hours a week doing something other than being with him, doing something that I semi-despise a lot of the time… just because, you know, I HAVE to. How stupid and wrong is it that the vast majority of people count the minutes until their workdays are over? How come none of my coworkers ever looks at me funny when they ask me, "How are you?" and I answer, "SOOOOO glad it’s Friday afternoon and I’m almost out of here!"

I don’t want to be unhappy. I don’t want to do stupid shit with and for stupid people all the time. I don’t want to spend so much time really angry and frustrated.

(Oh, and I want to make enough money to actually LIVE on. Current job? FAIL.)

I wasted my time and money on that master’s degree.

I don’t know. I’m to the point of reading the bible, in its entirety, in ORDER, because I just want something else.

And I try to be in the moment and amplify stolen moments of pleasure, but man. Man.

After beating myself up and hemming and hawing and praying and figuring, I half-way committed this morning to calming down, letting go, just taking the next LSAT, applying to the two law schools I’d consider, going if I get in, and just chilling the eff out for a while if I don’t. I mean, accepting. Accepting that this is our life. Stop and smell the roses… from the sidewalk in front of the studio apartment we will hardly even be able to afford, even with all the crappy stuff I spend my time doing in the name of "making a living." Of "supporting my family."

I want a husband. I want money enough to cover the basics. I want to make a home and be happy. I want to spend most of every day giving M the impression that he IS a drummer, an artist, Superman, king of the swings, whatever he wants to feel like on a given day. His school is GREAT, and my job enables him to have that, but I’d rather he had a fulfilled, happy mom more of the time.

What did Marx say? About alienation of the worker from the product of the work? Yeah, that. I raise other people’s kids so that I can afford to have other people raise mine. Oh, and so we can eat and sort of have a roof over our heads.

I am tired.