luckycanuck

I've got the weekend in a house full of couples. Roxy and Alleluia both have their respective guys over and with Helga away I am surrounded by coupleness. It's not a problem (or not yet) and I don't think it will be one. To some extent it would still be nice to either have the whole place to myself or have some single support. It has been nice having Helga single again. Roxy's guy we rarely see because he lives in Melbourne, and Alleluia's guy seems to elicit mixed opinions. Today I was fine, but on other days I've found myself feeling slightly aspie stressed when interacting with him. Helga doesn't seem to like him at all.

I rearranged furniture this morning to better accomodate the new heater. I'm not sure if others will like it or if they will make their own rearrangements.

There is a birthday tonight with a "fluffy" theme that I am considering going to. Alleluia made plenty of suggestions, and at some point it was pointed out that because I have no shortage of hair on my arms and legs, I could just turn up in shorts and a t-shirt. In Canberra in June. Or may be not.

YW: 1 minute bench jumps, 1 minute 24kg SDHP, 1 minute 2*15kg shoulder press, 1 minute rest. Continue until at least 100 of each has been done. 131 bench jumps, 113 SDHP, 100 shoulder press in 14:15.

TW: Run 1km, 10 burpees, 10 32kg kettlebell swings, 10 situps, 10 pullups, 10 hand release pushups - 10 rounds and drop 100m from the run each round. Time: 56 minutes. The kettlebell swings were the toughest. That's a lot of weight when mixed in with so much other work.

Also, in celebration of "resilience in all it's forms" I am promoting ENDURE: Run. Woman. Show. featuring and being produced by MYC (a marathon runner and all around champion.) It opens in July in New York before going on tour.

A lot of my general sightseeing and pushups were done last November when I was around, so my visit was less centreed around sightseeing and more oriented towards socialising with people I already knew.

On the Wednesday I came down from Boston on a Megabus which had free wi-fi on board. Wonderful. Every place I have stayed on this trip came with free wi-fi and now buses were providing it. It's as if in five years wireless internet will be literally everywhere.

Upon arrival I checked into The Jane and after putting together a short list of things I wanted to do, decided to try to cross one of them off immediately, and ventured out in search of Yankees tickets. There was a place on 42nd street inside a sports store that apparently sells discounted tickets on game day and I went to find nobody was there. A guy in the shop who didn't work there asked if I was looking for tickets and offered me his. It sounds like a scalper, but this was a guy in a suit and he didn't look the type. Still, I was a little bit uneasy taking one of his two tickets but was adequately satisfied that this was sufficiently legit. I was a little worried that I would get all the way up to the stadium only to be turned away or arrested for breaching Yankee laws, but aside from a pat down and being asked to lift up my shirt (to show I had no weapons I guess) I was let in and watched the game next to the catcher and left fielder from the Yeshiva University baseball team. The Yankees won 7-4 against the Orioles in a game that was rained on but not rained out. Luckily, in my terrible seats four rows from the very back behind the first base line, I didn't get rained on at all. Hooray for the cheap seats.

Also, apparently if you catch a home run ball hit by the opposing team, the Yankee fans will boo you until you throw the ball back on to the field. Odd.

Wednesday night after the game led me to McKenna's which is my local in New York in as much as I can be said to have a local. During Happy Hour they give out poker chips with your drinks which can be redeemed whenever you like for a free drink. That's how they do 2 for 1 deals. I also dropped into possibly the darkest bar I've ever seen. Dracula would have been happy to drink there. They had no liquor there. If you want something other than beer or wine, go elsewhere.

Thursday meant sleeping in a bit after getting home arond 4:00am and some wandering around seeing a convoy of about 30 caravans driving up 6th avenue as part of a hasidic preparation for Passover.

There were a number of people that I met the last time I was in NYC whom I saw again. Minou's friend (and now my friend) K, and a group of others who were attending a party until late Thursday (again, I got home after 4:00am) and set up another party for me to attend the following night.

On Friday I caught up with MYC whom I have not seen since high school. Almost half of my life has passed since we last met. I gave her a beyondblue wristband in recognition of her support of my 12 hour run, and our chat went on for about three hours, far longer than we had planned. I guess we had a lot to say. We were both full of surprises.

I also made a minor pilgrimage to JAQ's old neighbourhood and took some photos to feed her sense of nostalgia for her old hood. Then it was off to the Upper West Side where for the second time ever I set foot inside a New Yorker's home. They are cramped to say the least, but they did plenty with the space. We drove out to Brooklyn for a party held in a basement and again I got home after 4:00am.

Also, an Israeli woman on the subway who asked me for directions also said that I was a dead ringer for a friend of hers who is an Israeli Paratrooper. That is about the coolest doppleganger I have ever been presented with.

Saturday was largely a rest day as my nights out were catching up with me, but I did wind up attending a friend's birthday in a surf themed bar where I opted against my usual selection of beers and chose surfesque cocktails instead.

And on Sunday I left.

It was an exhausting time and I think it may have left me with a cold, but I loved it and I am sure I will be back. I am now acquiring a circle of New York friends with whom I get along very well. I wonder at times how my life would have been different if I had moved to New York instead of London in my mid 20s. God only knows who I would have met and where I would have gone.

Coming down from the high was tough though as it was last time. I know I live a long way from this environment and I never know when the next time I will come by will be. Here's hoping it's not too long. Will I ever become tired of visiting New York? Maybe. Or other destinations may become more appealing, but at the moment it always seems to be the place I want to get back to.

My career malaise seems to have made friends with the career malaise of others.

Helga came home last night and immediately asked if I could make a cup of tea (with a laugh that this is one of my core duties in the house.) She has been having frustrations with the culture at her workplace that I won't go into. There was the sense that working where she is is running down her impression of the kind of work she is capable of doing. I feel the same way. Everyone I talk to seems to think I am more qualified than I think I am. Over the last two months, I have more and more been feeling as though I will eventually be unmasked as a huge fraud who isn't good at anything and who is monumentally lazy. This also dulls my inclination to look for other work, because lets be frank, what else can I possibly do.

This afternoon

bakerypenguin posted about her own career frustrations. Again, there was a lot of overlap with the frustrations that Helga and I are experiencing. Everyone seems to be consumed with the sense that we have no actual skills and are thus disinclined to reach any higher.

Today there was a lecture from W (not nasty, and I probably should have known it was coming) about the importance of responding to everyone who contacts us, even if we have responded on the same issue earlier. Additionally, one of our other advisors is leaving and his position has been advertised. I've already done a few parts of his job and I suspect that I could do it, but I'm not going to apply. It would mean more money and probably more clarity in terms of my role, but I don't want his job. I am not really interested in learning the intricacies of his portfolio and the frustrations (again with those bloody awful letters) that led to him walking aroud in a black mood for most of December. Not even if it meant a 40-50% pay rise. (Part of me also thinks there would be less space for me to hide from work, and I think I hav ebeen hiding given the amount of actual productive work I can point to over the last two months.

Of course, not all of my friends are in despair over their work situations. A girl (MYC) whom I knew in high school and came across (I think on Facebook) has really been living the dream. In fact, she has devoted a whole blog to the subject. She's now living in New York and producing a play and both she and a number of people around her are doing what they love and pursuing their dreams.

The problem for me, is that I'm not sure if I have one. I don't think I have dreams anymore.

I have in the past. I've been fascinated by politics form a young age. At 5 I told my mum that I wanted to be Prime Minister. At 16 I was actively trying to make it happen. I decided against that specific career path but stayed in the field, working in politics on three continents. This used to be my dream, and given the fascination some of my friends still have for politics, it still is for them. But I just can't be bothered. I'm tired of the voters, of reading the papers, of managing relationships with legions of people I don't really like, of hearing people's opinions, of the media.

But I also have absolutely no idea what else I might like to do. Some people remain in toxic careers that make them miserable because they are chasing what some marketing wanker is telling them they want. I'm not staying in this job because I am locked into an expensive life. I've got no debt, no obligations, no major expenses keeping me living in fear, but I've also got no idea what else I might like to do. At the moment, every option looks negative. That's not just career wise. It has now spread into most aspects of my life. Staying in my current job, taking another one, changing careers entirely, starting a business, staying single, getting involved, buying a house, having kids, staying in Australia, moving back to Canada or America or anywhere else, all I see is negatives. So I wind up staying put and collecting my pay every two weeks.

Unlike one of MYC's friends, I can't go off and become a photographer, because I suck at photography (also I don't epecially like it.) I can, however, keep my head down and slog away at this job, which pays not a princely salary but more than I need to live on and allows me to keep throwing money on the pile. At the moment I feel like I can be annoyed, or I can be annoyed and get paid.

Ok. Now the good news.

I've contacted a counselling service contracted by work. I have my first appointment on Tuesday afternoon. I reckon because work played a large part in getting me all angsty, I can let them get me started on the turn around.

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Entries tagged with myc

Couples couples everywhere

New York in Review - The city that never sleeps more than five hours a night

Malaise is all around

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June 2012

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