This is the week when I turn it around. October 20, 2008

I think last week was just a bury-your-head-in-the-sand kind of week. It was my first week in Nashville, and my first week of being unemployed, or that we weren’t driving like it was our fulltime job. As you could probably tell, I felt pulled and pushed and uncertain and frail and I just wanted to get away from it all. What is it all? Oh, you know–the fearful freedom in my schedule, the discovery that both my husband and I forgot our six-month anniversary, the boxy muddle of our apartment, my sad ownership of only five long-sleeved shirts with winter rapidly advancing. And myself, of course, all the treachery of my hardworking little mind. I had myself all tied up in knots before I even left the house to go to the coffeeshop, or my office, as Erik cheerfully calls it. He can’t believe I am not doing better with the whole not working thing. He remembers all the things I hated about working, so he figures I should be like, the happiest person alive. I don’t think the poor man realizes that it’s complicated. When women think they want something, getting it is not guaranteed to make everything OK, and in fact, sometimes it makes it worse. 

Well, before I give up on myself, I am going to give this whole thing another chance. I am going to make myself a schedule and stick to it ruthlessly. I will awaken every morning at the hour of seven thirty. I will do some form of exercise. I will cook. I haven’t felt much like eating lately, so cooking has been kicked to the curb along with exercise. I will section my day into chunks and do only the designated tasks. This is the week I get my poop together, if you get my drift. I’m not going to get mopey and irritable. I am going to be a romantic wife and plan little surprises for my dear husband, who hasn’t eaten very much lately. 

So I had a good weekend, even though Erik was in Indiana on a 30-hour fast retreat. I got three new pairs of shoes at the Goodwill and they are lined up perfectly in the bottom of my closet. I went to a new church and played Scrabble at Fido. I lit candles and put on a CD and made myself all cozy in the duplex that annoyingly still smells like new paint and carpet like nobody lives here. I have to stamp this place with our own smell–in California it was the pomegranate elixir from Pier One. Isn’t that one of the first things you do when you move in? You mark your territory, sort of like a dog. 

I started reading a book called Julie and Julia about a 29-year-old aspiring actress who lives in New York and is married and works a crap job that totally depresses her, so she decides to take on the giant task of cooking through Julia Child’s French cookbook (500+ recipes) in one year. I wish I could find something like that to wrap my life around for the next year, a goal that I could reflect upon and feel worthwhile. I felt worthwhile after I carried all the moving boxes, but the last time I remember feeling thrilled with an accomplishment was several years ago when I scaled a 70-foot wall at a rock climbing facility. Does anyone know what I could do to plump up my self-esteem? Emily suggested that I take on NaNoWriMo next month (National Novel Writing Month) and churn out a book. I said, “But what if it’s bad?” She thinks that I can give myself permission to write a bad book because it’s my first time. There’s only one problem. What if it is bad the second time? 

Goodnight, then. I am ready for week two of being self-employed and fabulous, even if it kills me.