Life is often like a Lou Reed song...

Often the day starts out by not really starting out.  An antsy, unsettled sort of day where you're not sure what to do, where to go, whether to go there alone or with others and once you're there, does it make any difference at all?  Today is such a day.  Perfect really, like the song says, problems left all alone.  But I wanted to spend it with myself and now I feel that I spent it in a limbo state of semi-paralysis.

That's the trouble with long, hot days.  Want to do nothing, be nowhere, go no place, but when I do I feel as if I haven't actually had a day at all.  Nothing to show for it and no one to  talk to about it.  Wait, not true.  I spoke to one friend on the phone, sent two e-mails to family and went out to the local shops.

I have to remind myself not to take for granted the sheer pleasure of being able to call my own shots and make my own schedules.  I am not a slave to the commuter routine and my work, though not enough, allows me to be my own master.  This is quite a luxury.  I forget this most of the time. I spend too much time bemoaning loneliness or apathy and not enough time rejoicing in the freedom I have. 

Today I also decided that my 'career' is not yet over.  I don't mean my management training work.  That work continues, I enjoy it and I will carry on for as long as I can and the work is there.  I mean that I still have this feeling that there is something more I have to achieve, some unfulfilled promise that I need to realise.  This is a feeling I've had for a long time. it is unsettling and also frustrating.  It's as if I'm hungry and standing at the fridge looking at all the foods on display without choosing any of them. I know I want something, but nothing that I can see is 'it'.  It's the feeling that I'll know it when I see it, but that hasn't worked too well for me in the past.

When I was a kid in primary school every one of my teachers, without exception, wrote on my reports that though I had achieved a lot, I hadn't reached my potential. I remember wondering what my potential was, as if I was supposed to know what it was so I could reach it.  How, when I didn't even know what the word meant.  I only knew that the word was loaded with disappointment for those around me and that disappointment was directed my way.

I no longer feel that judgemental disappointment in myself, but I often feel an unsatisfied gnawing at the inner me.  I could do more, but what?  I thought all of these things today as I re-cut and re-designed a shirt, baked a cake, made some bread and then did some shopping so I could make dinner.  Like Lou Reed said, it was just " a perfect day,  it made me forget myself, I thought I was someone else, someone good".  Great song, Lou.