That Sunday Feeling

Trying to fight that Sunday afternoon dread--the "Awww crap! It's Sunday afternoon and I have to get up early and go to work tomorrow. I'd rather drink blood" feeling. I'm normally quite good at avoiding it (that feeling, and uh, also, drinking blood), but things have been so weird lately that work has sort of permeated my thoughts in off hours as well as on.

Part of me still does not know what I want to be when I grow up. Ridiculous, I know...I thought I'd have it all figured out by now. Ironically, I seemed to have had a much better grasp on my career path when I was younger. College, internships, full-time work in my field of choice. I did it all, and was on a solid path with minimal detours and distractions. Sure, I made a few mistakes, a couple of enemies, and ruffled a few feathers along the way, but somehow always managed to land on my feet.

Then somehow or another grad school, of all things, derailed my burgeoning journalism career. By the time I got out of grad school, 9-11 had happened, the economy had tanked, and my friends and I were reduced to taking whatever slim pickings were thrown our way. We were overqualified for truly entry level positions, and unable to land more mid-level jobs either. No longer students, we couldn't accept internships at most media outlets because they could not get by with "paying" us with college credit. I could no longer depend on the unpredictability of the journalism world to provide novelty and challenges during my working hours. My entire life had become a vortex of instability, unpredictability, and mere survival, with the occasional bit of novelty thrown in.

It's quite significant, then, that only in 2007 did myself and a few other close friends finally land decent enough jobs with salaries and in some cases, the increasingly novel menu of benefits. We agreed that 2007 was our Year of Transition. (FWIW, 2006 was roundly dismissed as the worst year of many of our lives. Funny how themes like this often cluster together. For awhile, I thought I was the only one who wanted to take a long walk off a short cliff in 2006. Turns out several people I'd lost close touch with while working insane hours for two-plus years had gone through similar trials during the exact same time).

All of that's behind us now. Or is it? Now that I'm at a "good enough" job, albeit one with a nutty, capricious boss, I find myself restless. The stability that I once craved is mine now, at least as long as I manage to hold onto it. But yet again, I'm not entirely sure which way to turn or where I want to go from here.