Wednesday, February 01, 2006
Something is wrong lately and I'm trying to figure out what it is. All of the sudden I tried to introduce order into my life by making todo lists, planning time allotments for various things I needed to do. Making lists of my homework and actually doing it. Trying to stay caught up with the textbook reading in at least some of my classes.
Great, right? Must mean I'm getting my shit together and I'm starting a successful semester. I don't think so. I think it is more of a sign that my grasp is slipping and I'm falling back on structure as a way to try to keep me going and even that isn't working so well.
Today I actually got prepared for Sanskrit class and did enough lines of translation so that I was confident that for once, if I got called on, I could give the right answer. So, my wish comes true and I get called on. Turns out that about 3/4 of the words I translated wrong and even once he gave me the right translations for the words, I still couldn't make sense of what it said. He'd ask me simple questions like "what case is it?" and suddenly I'd realize why he made it a recommendation not to take the class if you haven't studied a case language before. I guess with an upper level linguistics class with mostly linguistics majors, it shouldn't surprise me that they use a bunch of linguistics terminology to explain things and so I haven't the foggiest idea what he's even talking about some of the time, and that's when it is in english. So, not only did I make a complete ass of myself in front of the class but I realized just how terribly unprepared I am to handle this class and there is still a long ways yet to go.
I have a test tomorrow in one of my psychology classes and tonight I nearly wanted to just get completely drunk and I don't drink much and haven't been drunk since sometime 2004. I managed to stop myself at about 2 glasses of wine and was stressed enough that I didn't feel anything at all from it.
At other, just random times, during the evening my eyes would well up and my throat would choke up as if I'm about to start crying and I'd have no idea why. Maybe I shouldn't have changed my vitamin/herb regimin.
Maybe I'm just trying to take on too much at one time. There are still so many other things I feel like I need to take on in my life though, such as perhaps trying to find some social life. Maybe I should try to talk to some of the people in class I met or my neighbours that I met during the fire. I had the opportunity to do both today quite easily as my neighbours were in the hall talking and addressed me first and a girl in my class that I've met was sitting across from me before class. In both of those instances though, I was in such a funk that I just wanted to be alone. I did talk to one girl in a class this morning before I was awake enough to get blindsided by life again.
I still have to clean the apartment.
I still have to buy a pot and plant my new cactus.
I have a test tomorrow and another on Friday.
Things should be going great for me at this point in my life.
I try so hard at so many things. I read books in my spare time on the bus to try to be more well read and get exposure to more ideas. I read Hermann Hesse's novel Siddhartha and it fucking blew me away and I recommend it to everyone. Now I'm reading the classic science fiction novel Dune. I have tried to listen to a great variety of music. I try to eat healthy. I even try to cook upon occasion. I try to make my apartment a household. I care for my animals and my plants. I try to figure myself out. I try to deal with my past. I blog. I read the news. I'm going to college. I'm living on my own. I do well with my work.
I do all of these things and more trying to somehow improve myself and make myself worthy of something. I don't know if it is a vestige of my time in mormonism or my feeling like I need to earn friends or relationships or how I define my sense of worth or what it is. I just don't feel like I'm really progressing anywhere despite all of my efforts.
Sometimes I just want to leave it all behind and move off to some exotic locale and start over. As I should have learned from moving to Provo and then to Athens, the idea that you can really start all over in a new place is a myth. So much of life just seems like a big game that you can't escape and you have to play by the rules that other people created.
Sometimes I wish I had a social support group here in Athens. I have too much pride to ask for help most of the time even when I need it. Even if I could overcome this pride I'm not sure that I ever know exactly what help it is I need to even be able to ask for it. Even if I could put it into words, I have nobody here to even ask. That's kind of a scary thought, you know. I'd put myself back into therapy but due to university budget cuts I could only get 4 free sessions on the health plan and I can't afford to pay for any beyond that. Besides, although the last therapist was a great guy and it was nice to have someone to talk to, I don't think I really made any progress. I just need friends here who I can go to for help and who actually help me because they actually give a shit what happens to me.
In a song I was listening today, I heard a line that stuck out in my head. I don't see any connection to what's going on in my life and the line, but hey, maybe it's a subconscious connection. In any case, it's a great line:
'Innocence is pain in disguise'
They said.
Now I believe.
"Walking With Shadows" - Gary Numan