Hmm, another Tuesday morning, and I'm wanting to write. Wonder if this will turn into a trend? Maybe it's just a coincidence, but hey this would be TWO entries in September, a record!
So last week, I mentioned that I was feeling dried up. This hasn't changed much in the past week, but considering last week's entry was right after a 10 hour shift at work, as is this one, I suppose it shows my mind frame after coming off of work.
I'm very grateful to have a job. I will never say that I am taking it for granted. I will say, though, I do feel that the job IS beneath me. Here is a description of what I do: I take cartons off a truck and put them on a conveyor belt. For 10 hours, four days a week. Sometimes the cartons are heavy, sometimes they are light. Another guy stands at the other end of the conveyor belt and puts UPC stickers on each carton so they go to the correct truck. Sometimes I put the stickers on, but I'd rather load the cartons on the conveyor belt.
I'm a designer. I'm a builder. I'm a dream-maker.
At least, I was. And I am discouraged now that I am not. I don't do it in my professional life, I don't do it in my personal life. Somehow, someway, I lost my ability to dream. And I can't seem to jump start it back to where it once was. What changed? Why do I allow myself to drudge forward in a dull, grey world?
It is Septmeber. The cartons I load on the conveyor belts are filled with Christmas decorations for stores to sell. Every carton is cardboard- brown, and inside each of them are the deep evergreens, rich maroons and glittery gold of Christmas. But I see brown. And honestly, I don't care to see the rich majesty within the cartons. What is important to me is that these items get to the right store, and my job is to get the ball rolling on getting them there. The stores will have wonderful magical polyurethane snow-blankets and tall plastic trees, hundreds of thousands of twinkling happy icicle lights and inflatable reindeer soon, and I don't care if I see it at all.
This is my quest: to find out where my desire for living life to the fullest went to. And why I don't care.
Is it important to know why I don't care? or is it more important just to know that I don't care, reasons be damned? I'm not sure. I think I should know this, because if the why isn't important, than I should spend my energy elsewhere than to figure out why, and concentrate more on the situation.. rather than what lead up to the situation.
More later as the quest unfolds.
Bring a box-knife.
4 comments:
Hello Leigh, I haven't seen you for a while but I always read what you write. I have a theory about human beings and that is that there are two kinds, CB's and LB's.
The LB stands for Lazy Brains. They never question anything and just ramble on doing monotonous nonsense and are sort of like lemmings.
The CB's are Creative Brains that have super charged power and should be wearing tee shirts that have a bold CB on them that they can just slip into a phone booth and strip into when needed. The only problem is that the CB's get annoyed at living in a world of LB's.
I am not sure what I am saying but it sounded good when I typed it.
- your friend Rammy
My God, Leigh, it sounds like you've had your creativity castrated by the rote job from hell.
I've had those kind of jobs and, after recognizing I was being driven crazy be being turned into a numb little cog in a machine serving someone else, I quit. Of course, that was years ago when jobs were more plentiful. But I think you'd better seek different employment somewhere before you personally realize what "going postal" means.
This post made me feel depressed for my friend.
Treg
omigosh, don't be depressed. I'll be ok. I've have drudgery jobs before, and it's just a matter of attitude. Everyone who works there is in the same environment, and you make the most of it. you also find the positive out of things. I actually like putting cartons on the belt, it's good exercise, and is way cheaper than going to a gym and lifting weights, In fact they pay me! (not much :P) If I were to have gone postal, it would have been working at the parking ramp. 8 hours of sitting in a tiny little booth, the only distraction chasing the skater kids away. That was a maddening job, it's a good thing I had books to pass the dry times.
learns from these posts.. and luvs them dearly.
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