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Archives from 2002-2006

I have a hypothetical for you. Let’s say you have an opportunity to try an activity that’s always sounded interesting to you, but for a variety of reasons — it’s too intimidating, primarily, but also maybe just too inconvenient/unavailable? — you’ve never done so. Skydiving, for instance. A boudoir photo session. Spending a day working as an official cast member at Disneyland, dressed as a princess. Helping a zoo veterinarian sedate a Bengal tiger. Swimming with stingrays.

Here’s the catch: the whole thing is going to be filmed for a sort of online reality show. You’re going to be pushed way out of your comfort zone, and cameras will capture every unflattering moment.

Would you do it? If so, what experience would you choose?

Many years ago, I had a minimum-wage job working for a movie theater. It was a pretty fun job, as those types of things go, but god forbid you ever needed to miss a day of work. We got paid shit, we were treated like shit, but the way the management reacted if you called in sick made it seem like our jobs were as mission-critical as rocket scientists who were also firefighters on their way to a burning orphanage while carrying human organs packed in ice.

That’s sort of how I feel these days. Being at home all day often makes me feel like the most useless waste of food on the planet — my contributions to the world are nearly nil, and everything I do is cyclical. Everything has to be repeated over and over and over and over: nothing stays clean, article deadlines never stop coming, the laundry just keep re-generating itself like the blobby metal dude in Terminator 2.

And yet it’s goddamned near impossible for me to leave. I received an offer to travel out of town for a couple days — just a fun-sounding blogger event, something that sounded both interesting and like a nice break from business as usual — and the logistics involved in trying to make this happen have been nearly insurmountable. Who would pick Riley up from the bus stop? Who would take Dylan to preschool? Who would watch Dylan on his non-preschool day? The daily tasks that seem both mind-numbing and hugely unappreciated literally REQUIRE MY PRESENCE. If I’m not here, it’s a clusterfuck of epic proportions, trying to call in favors and beg for family help and work around schedules and feeling enormously guilty and like a massive pain in everyone’s ass.

Since my job is so very important, apparently, why then don’t I feel more of a sense of accomplishment each day? Or, say, ANY SENSE OF ACCOMPLISHMENT AT ALL.

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