~ Kommentary by Kritter ~

Adrift

I'm starting to wonder if I belong anywhere anymore.

I'm very unhappy here. I basically work all night and day. I have no friends. I have no time to hang out with the couple of people I have met anyway. I've made it into the city once and it was almost a month ago. This weekend (and last) I will work (worked) Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights. It's almost physically impossible for me. The kids can be rewarding, but it is getting harder and harder because, simply, they are not mine. The two and a half year old talks incessantly, oftentimes through naptime- the one supposedly quiet time of the day.

There is no joy in my life. I try to find it. I'm trying to pray. Trying to keep my eyes on the prize. Trying to remember why I am here at all. Trying to figure out if I deserve all that has happened to me in the last several months.

Sometimes a little thing like the stars will lift my spirits. I've never been one for the romantic notion that you and someone else far away are looking at the same stars. But suddenly, it is comforting.

My general plan is to remain here until Thanksgiving. Stay through the holidays in the Quad Cities with my parents and help with the family company. Hang out with my other sister and her family and a few friends I have in the area. Be quiet and try to recover from all the noise in my life right now. And then return to St. Louis until I have enough money to go to Mexico. Hopefully for the session at the end of March including the trip to Puerta Vallarta.

Just now, in the middle of writing this entry, I stopped and talked to my sister for over an hour. It was a really good talk. She told me I could leave at any time and she would hold nothing against me. She doesn't want to play in part in my misery. Really, she's not though. She does what she can. And I wouldn't be here at all if I didn't want to help her. It's just the lifestyle. And the transitions. And the job.

I am making good money here. But I've never been the type to have money be enough of a consolation for misery. If I have to put off Mexico a couple more months, it is worth my sanity. But I do think that I will try another month of self-denial. It's probably good for me. It's definitely good for my bank account.

But even when I leave here, there's so much fear. I don't quite fit here. Or in the Quad Cities. Or in St. Louis anymore.

People call me courageous for trying something new. So many people get stuck in a career or a house or a town and just remain stuck. I decided I wouldn't let that happen to me. But is the price worth it? I simply won't know until I have somehow survived this all. God pray I am a stronger and better person for it.

My brother-in-law says that when one door closes another opens. But right now, I am stuck in the hallway. It seems to be a long hallway.

Posted by kristen at October 14, 2005 03:33 PM