Early Check Out

It’s almost 2011.

2011.

And I am 26 years old.

TWENTYfuckingSIX.

Where did my time go?

I will be forthright and admit to wasting it. All of it. The whole thing. This entire 11 months has mostly been a waste for me. I have done some things, sure. But as I look over the last year, the last few years, I wonder, is this all?

Objectively I recognize that I am no different than any of my contemporaries caught in the net of the quarter life crisis. And really, the best thing I ever did was get older friends who reflect back to me that life is more than what it seems like it isn’t in your 20s.

But still, I constantly find myself dogged by the question, is that all there is?

I can’t really remember where I was a year ago. I think I was fresh off a trip to Chicago with Bob, trying to decide if I would deal with the issues left dying on the pavement after we imploded or walk away.

I walked away, by the way.

And here I am, a year removed from my removal, some things changed, some things the same, but everything seemingly… dormant.

Is that who I have become?

For the longest, this year especially, I have just been trying to remember how to feel. I haven’t been. At all. And maybe this is why I am not writing. Because I haven’t been feeling like I need to.

Or anything, really.

Intellectually I can say that the reason that I am right where I once was is likely because rather than going through, I just shut off. I have completely checked out on my own life. On a deeper level though, I have to admit it was not a conscious decision. I did what the BP oil rig was supposed to do; shut off automatically when the pressure got to be too much.

I have checked out. Instinctively. And now I have to see if I remember how to check back in.