Today's a day!
Today is the day I get this award for writing. I don't know what it is. Maybe it's a plaque or a piece of paper. The ceremony's a few hours off. I received an email reminding me of the event yesterday, along with a disclaimer of sorts saying that parts of my story are going to be read to the audience. FUCK that's weird. I'm having butterflies in my stomach wondering if it's me that has to do the reading. God I hope not. But if I have to I'll make sure it's a part that will make the crowd squirm in their seats.
Part of me, the gloat, the born black sheep, wants the big award...if their is such a thing. I was told that their are runner-up positions and the like. I'd love to win this one, if not for the ego boost, just to say, "Hey look what I did. I didn't even try for this shit. Imagine what I can do if I put my mind to it."
Time to step off that pedestal of dreams, though. Can't get ahead of myself.
In the real world, where dreams are just another joke, I'm looking for a mindless job that doesn't pay bad...waiting for financial aid confirmation...thinking about Hawaii and Maryland and all my friends getting married and having kids. I don't know if I'm cut out for that version of life.
At Thanksgiving, my very married sister and my cousin's fiance took the time to ask those questions..."When are you going to get married?"..."When are you going to have kids?"..."Are you seeing anybody?" Blahblahblah. I go to dinner with my mother and/or father once a week, and this week was no different. As I sat at the table with my mother and cousin, and my cousin's son, I of course couldn't eat without the familiar battery of questions. "Who are you seeing?"..."How's work?"..."Why do you talk like that?"..."Why can't you be more like..."... "When are you going to grow up?" I reflect on these uncomfortable moments and realize if this growing up to them, I don't want it.
I'm going to keep living this life on my own terms, and if that's too much for you, well...you're not me, are you? Maybe I've gotten too heavy with it, with it all...but the people who tell me to change and how to live are the same folks miserably working in a cubicle day in and day out, trying to reach some monetary or possession-based goal. It's a beautiful day outside. Point made.
Congrats again on the writing award, man. I've been thinking about creeping back into writing lately. You know, more than my mindless babble on here and other blogs. I mean real stuff.
You know, I was pretty convinced the marriage thing wasn't for me either. I just wanted to live out, sample the goods, try a little bit of every race, but then a girl comes along and I end up feeling domesticated. Decorating Christmas trees and buying a few new things to wear.
It is weird that people are getting married now and popping out kids. People we've known like freakin' forever. I was kind of nervous that I wasn't going to click and make any sense of adulthood, as if I would suddenly wake up one day and there you are; and adult. But you know what, that doesnt happen. If you look at parents and our friend's parents, they probably had no idea what the fuck they were doing when they got married, and were probably scared as hell when we came along, but you manage, and someday we'll be sitting in someone's kitchen saying "I'm really scared. I don't think I can do this" but we will. It's the way it is. The law of the jungle.
