THE GREAT GADFLY:

Leggo My Ego

Over the weekend, I've been giving a lot of thought to the ideas of investing vs. giving up, both from the perspective of "settling".

Yeah, it's gonna be one of THOSE rants today, I'm afraid. It's Monday, I'm still sick, and I just got back from two days in Indiana. What did you expect?

Oh, but anyway.

I think I'm getting to that place in my 30s where I'm starting to see the behaviors that guide and define my ageset, as opposed to just feeling like I'm still in my late 20s, plus a coupla shapeless years. As I enter what promises to be a seamlessly graceful "HOLY CRAP I'M IN MY THIRTIES" phase, I have to figure out what it's all about, what I can do about it, and what this means for my decorative collection of Jim Beam bottles currently on display in the kitchen window.

Okay, I was kidding about the Jim Beam bottle collection. Honest. But I do have a plastic monkey on top of my television set. A plastic monkey!!

More and more people I know are starting to go to church regularly. Ten years ago I might have balked and huffed, fearing that my bleeding-edge buddies had bitten the proverbial squaresville dust; but in the here and now, I'm kinda-sorta happy for them. I feel like they're a little safer, a little more grounded, that they're mixing with mellower folks than could be found at the cockfights and demolition derbies at which we once frequented.

My friends are joining book clubs, and I think it's great.

They're also doing crazy things like investing in nice homes, marrying, spawning, getting promotions, starting businesses...in short, my friends are turning into Big People.

And I have to ask myself: Do I want to be a Big Person too?

First, I'm not much of a churchgoer. My dad was Amish and my mom is currently an athiest. Which pew would you assign me? I've studied Taoism for the past fifteen years, on and off, and either it's gotten under my skin well enough that I live my faith without thinking about it (kinda central to the belief, if you ask me), or I'm so horribly lapsed in my spirituality that the very concept of the Uncarved Block has become...erm....an uncarved block. Which is it with me? I think it might be both. I think it's a matter of relativity. Certain interactions remind me of how plugged in I am to The Way Things Are as I believe them to be; sometimes I think the lack of a ritual and/or a "flock" has left me dreadfully lacking in some important way.

But are ritual and socialization in and of themselves central to having faith? Hmmm. Maybe I'm missing the entire point simply by asking that question. Or, I dunno, maybe I'm not. My entire attitude on my beliefs, be they spiritual or moral or ethical or even as to what the hell Mulholland Drive was all about, has always been, "my beliefs are personal and I'm not in the mood to haggle over 'em. I'm busy." Somewhere in the past ten years, I've developed a big electric chicken wire fence of libertarian thought (that's a small "l", not a large "L", thanks) that allows you to worship Zoot the Poodle God whilst declaring Dubya the most brilliant world leader in the entire history of ever, while allowing myself to respectfully say "yes, dear" and turn a somewhat-less-than-warm-shoulder to potential conflict.

And to a certain extent, I think this works.

But to a certain extent, I think it's also healthy to put those things important to you on a nice, long leash and take 'em out for a stroll every now and then. Let them get some air. Maybe let them sniff the butts of other beliefs and philosophies. Give 'em some exercise.

And so, yeah. I've noticed a lot of my friends are going to church lately. And I think it's great. But that's not really what today's rant is about.

It's like this: my hair's getting really fucking grey. More like silver, actually, but the point is, if I catch my reflection from waaaaay across the room, the grey's right there. It's noticeable. It's clear. I have, like, Mister Fantastic hair. It's not that I'm getting Mister Fantastic hair. No. I have Mister Fantastic hair. And honestly, that fact in and of itself doesn't bother me. I kinda like it - and anyway, it's better than going bald. But I have to acknowledge the fact that I'm physically manifesting something that says, "honey, you ain't a stupid little sack o' party no more."

To which I indignantly reply, WELL, DUH. I KNOW THAT. PASS ME THE DAMN FERIA ALREADY.

But the question waaaay at the top of this caterwaul resurfaces: when do I start investing in The Big Things and what do I have to give up so as not to look like a developmentally retarded also-ran goon?

It's time for a bit of a revelation: I really don't like my latest job. But the reasons have less to do with it being a horrendous, crappy place and more to do with a voice inside telling me I don't belong, and that it's time to quit bullshitting myself into dreary office jobs with adequate pay and serviceable benefits, just because it keeps me in new CDs and brussels sprouts every couple of weeks and gives my mom less reason to worry about my well-being. Oh, the people are decent enough. The work is tolerable enough. I even have a desk with a beautiful window view of Lake Michigan. It's just...well...I can't help but realize that my light is securely tucked under the most opaque of bushels.

Not that new CDs, brussels sprouts, and putting my mom's mind at ease aren't important things. Indeed, these are three of the most important things in my life. But I think there could be more apt ways of squirreling away these precious acorns than dressing like an office-casual chump and doing the nine-to-five.

At work I look around me, and I see co-workers who are my age if not younger. They're well-dressed. Scrubbed. Smiling. They're on career tracks. They're team players. They give three hundred percent. They talk the work and walk the work. And me? I wake up, get outta bed, drag a comb across my head. I throw on whatever's clean, put in my eight hours a day, do my thing, and go home with hopes that I can make as little eye-contact as possible with the throngs of urban go-getters who will certainly see into my soul and realize there's nothing for me to go or get in the world of business luncheons and corporate seminars. Nothing. I might as well be doing crossword puzzles for eight hours every day.

Meanwhile, when I'm able to sit my ass down in front of my computer and spend an hour or two focused on writing, I feel like I'm devouring mountains and parting seas. It becomes clear to me that, whether or not I'm any good at it, this whole writing thing is What I Do. And if Pamela Anderson can have a monthly column in Jane, there's certainly a niche for me out there somewhere, if only I were to pick up the ball and start running with it again. An edgy little monthly tract for Cat Fancy, perhaps?

But then I look at the people I know. The friends who, just ten or so years ago, were convinced they were going to change the world. The artists, the writers, the actors, the rock stars, the activists, the freaks, the visionary kooks...and how they're now working in big corporate labyrinths like the one in which I currently languish, getting ready to buy that SUV they've been eyeballing ("oh, I know it's obnoxious, but it's so much easier with the children and all..."). One friend sent me an e-mail to officially announce that she was giving up creative writing for good. Just no time for it anymore. Shit like that, it stings a little every time I see it. I don't necessarily feel like these occurences have to be bad things...I just feel like I lose another little piece of what I thought it meant to be alive.

And I have to wonder, am I next? And if so, when? And will it be like when a family puts their pet to sleep, and Fluffy doesn't even know what's happening?

Now, don't get me wrong: I'm all for refining with age. I'm all for identifying those things that were sexy at 21 and that have become kind of silly at 31, and making changes appropriately. I'm all for going to bed early and getting up early, because that's what my body is telling me to do; rather than trying to squeeze my delicate constitution into some party-party madman schedule that leaves me grainy, useless and disgruntled over the next few days. I'm relieved that I can get out of having to go to some lame-ass general admission indie-rawk plainchant-fest just by saying "I'M OLD!!!!", because I never liked that shit to begin with, other than perhaps a few pleasurable minutes of recognizing a song or two I have on CD, which I'd rather be hearing than the squonky live attempts.

I've been all for letting go of lots of things that comprised my youth. Happily. Gladly. Eagerly.

It's a bit harder to start acquiring the things that seem to be making up adulthood. Or at least, the things I'm assuming make up adulthood.

It's kinda difficult for me, as I'm sure it is for a lot of folks. I'm really feeling my way around in the dark here. I wonder sometimes, how is my "thirtysomething" different than the neatly summed-up travails of that show of the same name, to which my mom seemed to relate so effortlessly way back in the day? What parts of coming into this part of life are timeless, and which parts of being Mommy and Daddy's age are irrelevant because of the times in which we live? It would be nice if I had a big family with lots of siblings and uncles and aunts and grandparents who can tell me how it was back in their day, and perhaps I could piece together some kind of mosaic of what's true to a person as they go through life, rather than what was true in the '60s or the '70s or the '80s. But lucky me, I could fit my family on the head of a pin and still have room for a Christmas tree.

Do we become our parents? SHOULD we become our parents? Is it okay to run screaming from the very thought of becoming our parents, or are we only running from ourselves?

Holy crap, that last blurt frightened me.

When I see my mom, I see Rubicons crossed. I see a shedding of a skin with which I grew up, and the growing of a new skin that does things that my mom never used to do when she was younger. Part of this, I think, is because she's had a tough time of it over the past decade and just wants some peace. Part of it, I think, has to do with becoming diabetic and not exactly having the easiest dealings with it. Part of it, though, is that she has a fairly high-ranking job at a fairly conservative small-town Indiana organization, and it's just easier to bend with the breeze and be one of the old gals these days.

And, you know, we live our lives the best we can and it's okay. But it's damn sad.

And it makes me a bit confused. Part of me is a blazing madman unwilling to part with what I've come to know is my very identity, even if the price is that of my winding up some marginal toothless blathering freak on the fringe of society. Part of me is beginning to wonder if it isn't a necessary part of being alive to sacrifice large chunks of what one sees as one's identity in trade for some kind of better future.

I want to approach one of my co-workers in their Banana Republic chocolate/charcoal success costumes and ask them, with 100% full eye-contact, "is it worth it? I mean, really? Really?"

At what point does one hold on to ideals and standards and principles, and at what point is a person simply carrying unrealistic conditions and faded idealism? At what point does realism cease to be an invited participant in one's life, and at what point does it start to become a life-altering virus?

Oh, yeah. Askin' the big questions today. Whee.

I'd like to get up early every morning and know I'm going somewhere that's gonna tap as much of my abilities as it can, and that I'll engage in kind because it brings me joy. I see other people experiencing that kind of rush, and I feel guiltier than I do jealous that I don't share in that experience. I'd like to cohabitate with someone, go in halfsies on big, expensive pieces of furniture and crazy insane month-long vacations simply because we're Together And We Can. But it's impossible for me to do the relationship thing just because I want some stability and the ability to do these things, and not so much because I'm absolutely insane about the person I'm shacking up with. I see so many people who treat spouses like a successful applicant - like one more thing that they managed to snag before the threat of plunging into oblivion finally got the upper hand. And that way of thinking, once so unacceptable to me, becomes more and more plausible the older I get. Not any more acceptable. But plausible.

Maybe there's something to living one's life in quotes. Maybe I need to embrace the idea of a "career" and find someone I can be "in love with". I always used to think there's settling, and then there's "settling". Maybe it's all the same goulash of quiet disappointment and retracted expectations. Maybe that's the very sequence of what it is to experience life. Maybe it's nature.

I harbor doubts.

I think we all deserve the things which we spend our entire lives manifesting. I think that's nature. But then, I feel conspicuously adolescent saying such a thing.

Someone I know quit his job over the weekend. Just up and quit. Wanted more time to "do his thing". Dunno if this is something he can afford or not, but dammit, he's doing it. I've been in the same position, not because of choices I've made, but because of choices that have been made for me. Getting fired. Freelance assignments that end. And as a result, I scramble to find something better. Before I got this current job, I was shooting spitwads at the moon - crafting resumes that were pie-in-the-sky supahstar hoo-haa and collaborating with people on television projects...then I got a nice, tame, APPROPRIATE office position that seemed to solve a lot of logistical problems - i.e., "how will I eat?" and "how will I pay rent?" - while throwing a big bucket of cold water on the right side of my brain.

I'm doing better than I was a year ago.

But that's not saying a whole lot.

At least I'm at a place where I can roll thoughts like these around in my head, rather than consuming my thoughts with "how am I going to avoid getting my phone turned off this month?" I do appreciate being at such a point. And who knows, maybe next year I'll be even more placated and my problems will be even MORE obnoxious and precious.

I see no reason not to aspire to bigger investments in life while at the same time holding on to my ego. It's an ego worth fighting for....I think???

But yeah, well, anyway. I think it's cool that my friends are going to church. I hope they pray for my doomed ass.