7 PM on a Sunday night. The house is silent: Wife and son are off with the in-laws, maid is off with maidly friends. Just the dog and I, and he'd rather be out exploring the neighborhood.
Just to update everyone, I've been working and commuting and doing family-type things like family photos and such; I've also been studying for my automobile and motorcycle license-type stuff. And I've been getting the paperwork sorted out for my external degree course at the University of London. It seems I'm going to have to take a A-Level exam. At 35, I've got to sit for an A-Level, as U of L does not recognize the American CLEP test. So I've been sorting that out. Fun fun fun.
I've also been trying to sort out my head and my heart.
It's not a midlife crisis, but I am sort of questioning what the hell I'm doing with my life. What I *want* to do with my life. What's important. Drawing cartoons, however amusing, can't be it. Teaching kids how to read, while fulfilling, is not my life's calling or ambition. Writing… well, writing is always there, in the back of my mind, but to be honest I haven't got the interest at the moment to finish anything I've already started, and I haven't got the time, energy or inspiration to start anything new. Bu the itch is still there; it's always there. It never goes away. There is a constant, droning voice inside my head that mutters 'you should be writing, you should be writing, you should be writing…'
Maybe I should be. Just finished Atwood's 'Surfacing' (it'll be on my A-level, doncha know) and the small, egomaniacal voice inside me muttered in disgust 'Christ, I could do better than that'. To which the less-small, sardonic voice inside me replied 'Okay. When are you gonna?'
Silence.
Whole lotta questions, whole lotta forward motion getting built up; in four years I'll finally, actually have a degree. Then what?
I'm too old to save the world. To be honest, right now all I want do is tour the world or buy one small, beautiful corner of it and dig my burrow.
An adventure is, by nature, a thing that comes to us. It is a thing that chooses us, not a thing that we choose. ~G.K. Chesterton
6 comments:
Depends how much importance you attach to the degree I guess. Why do you want the degree anyway?
External course at University of London? Maybe this is a really dumb question, but I'm going to ask it anyway: are you going to be able to stay where you're at now or do you have to move to England?
You're thirty-five, not eighty, you're still young enough to solve world problems, write influencial and astounding literature, and even if you were eighty, as long as the mind was nimble, you could do the above as well.
I know the trap. I tell myself about all of these writers I know who were published by my age, about how if I was really, really good, I would have been already...yada, yada, yada. Don't listen to that voice.
I'll give you some advice The Advisor gave me, "When you know, you know." A person can't have anything figured out in one evening.
Life's path isn't linear? (Hallmark but true)
Jae
This would be hypocritical of me (of all people) to say, but I'm gonna say it anyway:
Why not just ride the wave and see where it takes you -- how much harm could it do? Maybe you'll save the world from earthly peril, maybe you'll find mortal happiness in your already promising nest. Either way, you'll be happy, right?
Just follow your heart..don't be so troubled...coz guess there will be more things for you to worry about other than this? Cheer up~! =)
Oh..btw I am also taking a UOL external degree...Glad to know you are too.. =)
well the saying goes: "if you think you're too old, then you probably are."
you probably need to meet more people in the field that you're interested in. that might just knock some decisions into action.
i ditched my degree for my interpreter's license and i have no regrets. i've not decided yet if i will eventually complete the degree for the sake of self-fulfilment, but i know there are things i want to do just for the sake of doing them. afterall, we only live once.
saving the world got age limit meh?
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