This Is My Life
Saundra over at Headspace encapsulated my life in a sentence: "It's hard to be king of the world when you know you have to go scrape out a tuna melt pan." That is how I feel all the time. I don't have any contest awards under my belt like she just won (and much deserved), but I still feel like I do great things that always get pushed aside for everyday life. I suppose that's how life works for everyone to some degree.
What's most remarkable about Saundra (besides her writing) is the fact that she could go through so many rejections and keep going. I think this is even more admirable than winning a contest. I'm paralyzed by the mere thought of rejection.
The only thing I ever entered writing-wise was a poetry contest in high school, but I didn't even enter it. My teacher entered me without my knowing. I placed second in the state. I was proud as could be, but it didn't help my confidence. In fact, it probably made me more scared. How could I face the inevitable rejection when I placed so high my first time out?
I don't even write poetry anymore. I'm too jaded. I see poetry as artistic expression full of emotion or beauty or both. Most poetry I see is so bad it makes me hate it, but the good is so good that I can't possibly taint its existence by writing my own drivel. The last time I tried to write something, I kept thinking about how stupid it was. And most of the stuff I wrote in the past is pretty stupid too. I know I can't always write works of art, but I still have that expectation. It's a wonder I have even allowed myself to keep the past stuff. It's incriminating. The bad poetry police might find it and flog me with a copy of Robert Frost's poetry, thinking it might beat some sense into my sappy ass.
It's been so long since winning that contest that I don't think I have it in me anymore either. Then there's the part of me that explains that contest as a fluke. I go back and read that poem again and find all kinds of things I want to change. So either the poem was a piece of crap, or I don't know what good is. Either way, I've explained myself into thinking there is no way I can be good enough to do anything else in the poetry world.
For a while I thought I would write novels instead. Poetry doesn't bring anyone any money anyway, and I really didn't want to live the starving artist life to be discovered and idolized after death, not that that would happen or anything. So I changed my focus to fiction, and I even bought a writer's guide once. Of course, you have to write whole stories to send anything in, and I never finished anything. Like all the rest of the projects in my life, I lost interest in my stories almost as soon as I sat down to write anything about them. And if that didn't happen, everything halted as soon as I came to a point where I had to do some research.
Research is the main thing that keeps me away from writing now, aside from the belief that I just plain suck. Ironically, I love learning and read non-fiction regularly for the sheer entertainment and educational value. I like to know how things work and why. Science fascinates me, and the idea of being in a library hours on end is akin to snuggling in front of a fire with hot cocoa for me. But my little devil voice tells me I would be doing all that work for naught, because I'm not good.
I probably never will subject myself to that kind of rejection. Writing for real isn't very high on my list of priorities right now, and it's not like I don't enjoy other things too. I get my small bit of satisfaction from posting online, but I know I'm still just a wannabe and probably always will be in that area.
What is a priority to me right now is to get my house in order. I'm not just talking about cleaning, though that definitely needs done. I'm talking about making the house look nice when it is clean. I'm sure no one believes I actually took interior design and architecture classes in college because I haven't done a thing with that knowledge. Procrastination and indecision are my primary foes, but no one else knows that. Most people just nod their heads and say, "Oooh," when I tell them my selected majors in college. Meanwhile, they are thinking, "Yeah, this house looks like a person who's good with interior design."
Forgetting the procrastination, because I've explained that enough in the past, choices are like a brick wall to me. I like too many things and styles. A budget helps a little bit, but there are still a lot of choices even at the low end of the monetary scale. I have honestly stood in a store for an hour trying to pick one thing. Then, if I do come to a decision, I will find something else I like for the same room that doesn't match. I need to just buckle down, pick a style and stick with it. But then something new will come out that I absolutely adore, and I will regret it. At least, that's what I think will happen. I'm never satisfied, and I like way too many things. I need a mansion just so I could decorate in all the ways I love.
I hear my affliction is not all that uncommon in the interior design community. Maybe that's what makes us want to be designers in the first place. We just love all kinds of styles, so much so that we cannot choose for ourselves. But I do need to get over it and decorate my house. I really have to keep in mind that I can always change it or adapt it.
It's not like I'm living in my dream house as it is. It's small. It's a ranch. It's nondescript tract housing built in the 60's with the original kitchen flooring and cabinetry (read: ugly). It has a few redeeming qualities, like wood floors in the bedrooms and even underneath the living room/dining room carpet. I like that it's red brick, and it sits on a heckuva plot of land for Pittsburgh with a flat back yard no less. But it lacks character, and it would take a major remodel to give it that.
Still, we will probably be buying it in the next couple months after renting for three years. We know it; it's strengths and weaknesses. And the thought of moving again makes me want to wretch. The neighborhood alone is enough to keep us here. We thought that anyway, but after everything that happened with Booie and all the help and support given to us by this community, there is no way we could leave. You have to know when to compromise, and the sacrifice of staying in a house I don't love is a small one.
If I get myself in order, I would like to go back to college next year. Booie will be in school all day, so I will have a lot more time. I will probably pare down my two majors to just one and stick solely with interior design without architecture. Part of me isn't sure that's what I really want to do with my life though, and I don't know if that's the usual self-doubt talking or the part of me that knows. So maybe I'll wait one more year and go get a job outside the home or something while I sort things out. You'd think I'd have it figured out by now, but I'm indecisive about everything (I am so Gemini). Committing might mean I fail, and I'm still not ready to face that.
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One Year Ago Today:
