No Homeland in this post - Emma, you can read!
One of my best friends and I had a drink yesterday. He is
unexpectedly going away for two and a half months (lucky bastard) in Europe (I
kind of hate him right now) and so we hastily decided to plan a catch up. T.
has attempted to break into the academic world in a related field, and he did
everything right. But still – no guarantees in this game. He’s just finished a
publishing degree, which is kind of funny given that it’s as much of a gamble
as academia, I think, but he’s seriously talented and he has a really good
chance of making it work. He gently tried to prepare me for this life I have
chosen, not in any negative sort of way but because he doesn’t want me to get
hurt, especially given he has only known me in the time I have been very sick and
then while I was getting better (we were just becoming friends as my life was
falling apart in earnest in the second half of 2005). In some ways he knows
more than most about just how bad it got.
‘I know it will probably take me about twenty years to get
even close to the sort of job I want, an associate lecturer position or something
similar,’ I said.
‘Twenty years?’, he almost gasped. ‘I’ve waited two and a
half years and it seems like forever. I can’t imagine waiting much longer.’
‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘I can do this. It might take that long to
get really, really good at it. I know I have to get better at a lot of stuff,
and most of it scares the hell out of me. But I can do this.’ And I smiled into
my glass of wine, and then at him.
I need to hang onto that knowledge. I somehow know that I
can do this, what I’ve chosen, and I know there’ll be a lot of times when it
doesn’t feel like that and I will doubt myself into a well of complete despair.
However there’s also a part of me that knows I am very well suited for this
lifestyle and what it entails. I haven’t had the guts to ask my mentor yet
about teaching specifically, but I can learn. (I can I can! [Keep telling
yourself that!]) I’ve also met a lot of postgrad students who aren’t anywhere
near as thirsty for this as I am, and without my skill set or natural ability.
(Half of you must be wondering if you’re actually reading my blog right about
now. Such positivity and slight arrogance!) And I want this. I can wait it out. I can practice and get better and
hang on until it happens.
My illness has taught me patience, it seems. I took a very
long time to pick what I wanted to do with my life, and as I don’t envisage
myself ever getting a lot of the big stuff right, it has been especially
important to me to pick the right career. It’s not like I have a family to
support in the immediate future, and I know that I can make ends meet no matter
what. I was paying rent to my parents, for almost all of my own living
expenses, for my music lessons and for school stuff when I was earning $6.89 an
hour and going to school five days a week at 16 and 17. I can survive. I’m not
saying it won’t be hard, but I can cope. (I might need you all to tell me that
sometimes!) I can bite down and not let go. (Like a dog, I say!) While ever it
is just me I am OK just getting by until I make it happen, even though I know
there is a modicum of luck involved here too.*
This has been the most mad, complicated, joyous, impossible,
ridiculous year. It hasn’t gone the way I hoped – Frankie remains unwritten and
no tangible things to show for it, and when friends were posting Honours
results all over facebook I felt crappy as hell. Not finishing on time feels
like a failure and I have so much to make up for, so much left to do. But I’ve
started. I am part way there, and this doesn’t happen overnight, or even within
a year, it seems. I can do this, all of
it. (Eventually!)
At the beginning of the year I said I wanted to work harder
and be more adventurous. This year I saw my name on a conference programme for
the first time. I essentially ran a seminar on my own and I did it well. I met
up with friends with some regularity and so often felt like we were closer at
the end of the meal. I made new friends and tried new experiences. I didn’t do
as well as I wanted, but I did better, and I think that’s enough. I will do
better next year, next time, next everything. Maybe I’m not such a pessimist
about myself after all. (Or maybe at 29 I finally know the crap I have to tell
myself to keep going.)
This time of year there is a lot of stuff written about how
we’re too consumerist, which is true a lot of the time, and that buying
presents for one another is subsequently unethical, wasteful and really
irresponsible, which can be true but doesn’t have to be. I think that it’s
possible to buy things for one another, or make things for one another, that
are meaningful and which honour how we feel about one another, without filling
our lives with plastic crap and ‘stuff’ that has no purpose or sentimental
value. I love making the mix CDs for people I care about, and I love choosing
gifts for people that I know will be used and loved. I searched for ages for
the perfect Christmas ornaments for my mother and for my mentor. One of those I
chose for the latter was a small, white owl that was the best on offer at a
small shop I love near my uni, and it was perfect. Owls symbolise wisdom and
protection; I held it in my hands, its cold clay comforting in the summer heat
and couldn’t think of a better sign that this was for N. His gift also includes
some very good quality coffee, but I like to think he can hang this and the
other ornaments I gave him on his tree every year and remember that they came
from me and smile. The gift also included a card with lots of nice things
written on it that might be over the top, but life is fragile – we should tell
the people we love how we feel and why. These things matter. This card, and
this gift, matter.
So at the end of this crazy year of bad decisions and modest
good fortune, I think about what really matters and I say the words that lead this post: bless this mess. I am
grateful that it is hard, that it is messy. I don’t pretend that there is
method in the madness and that there is a meaning for all the craziness, both
that without and that within. But my life is meaningful. I trust that I am
going somewhere and that I can do this, and I am grateful for the people who love
me and encourage me, as well as those who don’t. Slowly, too slowly sometimes,
I am making my life into what I want it to be.
Bless this mess. Happy Christmas, friends xx
*Anyone who says otherwise is either naïve or a liar.
