Mediocrity

My life is not that bad.

My marriage is not that bad. Just bad enough to make me feel miserable, but not so bad that there’s a definable reason to call it quits, like abuse or alcoholism or anything like that.

My job is not that bad. Just bad enough to make me feel like my soul is dead, but not so bad that I can afford to sacrifice the benefits, flexibility and decent pay.

My health is not that bad. Just bad enough to keep me in pain most of the time, just bad enough to keep me from enjoying almost anything, just bad enough to keep me struggling to get to work for at least six hours a day, but not bad enough to get disability or a leave of absence.

I am struggling. I can barely get to work in the morning. Each day I struggle with myself about whether or not I can justify calling in sick yet again. It’s a combination of feeling like shit with my sinus pain, and depression from being in pain all the time and hating my job and not being satisfied in my marriage. I have not been sleeping well at night, even though I feel exhausted all day, and I don’t know if that’s because of the depression or because I force myself to make it through the day without taking a pain pill because I don’t want to get addicted and then finally, at 6 or 7 p.m., with my headache and facial pain in full swing, I take one so that I can at least deal with my three-year-old, and then I feel decent for a few hours so I take advantage of it and stay up later than I should. And then I wake up sluggish and tired and feeling like crap and the whole cycle starts over again.

I feel ungrateful for hating my job so much. It is a good job, a cushy job. I write articles for newsletters at a university. It’s pretty much brainless work, and generally there’s not much, if any, stress that goes along with it. I spend a good deal of the time here surfing the ‘net because I’m so painfully unmotivated to write yet another profile or story about the latest administrative changes or grant that’s been awarded. I’m left alone to do my stuff. I get paid more than my work is worth. I get more vacation and sick time than 90 percent of the working population. And yet every day, my soul cries out to me in protest. I can actually hear the words in my head: “You have to find a way out of this! This isn’t what your life is meant to be! You can’t stand this much longer! There’s got to be something else you can do!” And then I think about the benefits, and the subsidy I get for the university-owned daycare that Bubba goes to, and I realize I am stuck here, and I die a little more inside.

As I write this, I realize that much of the same could be said about my relationship with J. The two situations are more similar than I really realized before this moment. I am unmotivated, tired from the trying and the constant disappointments. I hear the same kinds of phrases in my head: “You have to find a way out of this! You need to leave. You need to realize it’s hopeless.” And then I think about how much debt we have and how difficult it would be to divide it and where would I live and how would we deal with custody arrangements. I think about how J. is really not that bad. He doesn’t drink, he holds a job, he doesn’t hit me or Bubba. Or I look at J. when he’s sleeping and my heart gets warm with the memory of how he used to be happy most of the time and how he made me laugh and I think of how much I want to work things out. Either way, I feel stuck here, too.

And that’s when I start thinking about jumping in the car and driving, just driving. Leaving all of it behind. But I can’t leave my Bubba. I have trapped myself in my own web of mediocrity without even trying (kind of ironic, isn’t it?) Is it a life full of “safe” choices that's brought me here? I look back on some of the decisions I’ve made and I see a pattern: I will study English because I’m not good at math. I will major in journalism because I have to earn a living. I will marry J. because who else would want to be with me, and this might be my only chance for any kind of love. I will work at this shitty job or that shitty job, because I have to get experience so I can get a better job (that I still hate). I have to, I have to, I have to. Rational. Practical.

The only big life decision that I can’t (or maybe don’t want to) put into the pattern is the decision to have children. I still haven’t figured out exactly why I did it…not sure if it was a response to a biological urge, or if it was because we’d been married for seven years and we were “supposed to,” or if I felt it was my duty as a woman, or if the more difficult it became to achieve it the more I wanted it. Probably all of those things. I strangely don’t remember much about really wanting to be a mother. I remember wanting a child, but not really thinking about being a mother. I never really looked too far beyond the mental image I had of contentedly nursing my newborn in the rocking chair, like something out of a commercial.

Sometimes I think maybe it’s time to stop the rationality, the practicality, the have to-s. To just say fuck it, quit my job, leave my husband, and start over. Try just having faith in the universe or whatever to carry me along and keep me afloat. As tantalizing as this is for a moment, I think about how royally the universe has screwed me over so far and I know this is a pipedream.

Fate hands some people in this world everything they could want or need. For others, fate’s hands are empty again and again, and they scrabble for a kernel of corn and a drink of water and watch their children starve. For the vast majority of us, though, it isn’t so black and white. I believe – and maybe this is where I’ve gone wrong all these years – that we have to play active part in steering our lives. I don’t have faith that if I just let go of the wheel, things will be okay. Maybe that lack of faith is the problem in my life…or maybe it’s what keeps me from being a homeless drunk. Who knows?

I don’t trust myself anymore.