I'm about to start an overdue assignment. It's three in the morning. It's meant to be on one of many books that we may select. Unfortunately, I possess none of those books. I do not have the money to buy said books. I have attended one class of the subject the assignment is on in five weeks of the semester. This is due to a combination of being horrendously sick for about four weeks, and having my face fitted with braces metallic enough to make me appear reminiscent of a character from Revenge Of The Nerds. There was also this one time where one of the wires on my lower braces SPRUNG FREE FROM ITS CONFINES AND BEGUN VICIOUSLY POKING THE INSIDE OF MY RIGHT CHEEK UNTIL IT BLED PROFUSELY UNTIL I COULDN'T TALK AND HAD TO HAVE AN "EMERGENCY ORTHODONTIC APPOINTMENT" TO FIX IT LEST MY CHEEKS WIND UP IN TATTERS. I now have a severely sliced-up mouth and a very poor attendance record.
So naturally, I'm thinking I'll just drop it.
That will put me down to two subjects this semester. I'll technically be a 'part-time' student.
But you know what? Compared to the gruelling pressure and shame of being consistently absent, inept and late-to-the-party where uni is concerned, I would consider it a blessing. It also should be mentioned that it'll give me a lot more time to watch re-runs of Doctor Who, and I consider that to be far more beneficial to my existence than any second-year Literature subject. More than that, it would give me more time to focus on the things that I enjoy - like photos and writing.
What I'm saying is, I've hit a mental slump.
I referred to it over the weekend as being in 'two worlds'; as having 'one leg in, one leg out' of my university studies. On one hand, I'm a privileged student at a university studying a creative writing degree and I owe it to myself/my future to attend/get shit done. On the other, I'm kind-of a photographer kind-of working nights and kind-of feeling professionally and socially committed to that glittering realm of relentless disco-piggery, pained hangovers and kewl musak. Two worlds.
The nagging question in my mind in the face of all this lifestyle dissonance is this: am I hopeless? Am I descending into an abyss that will land me without a degree and eternally unemployed? Will I wind up like -insert failure relative here that everyone has-? Am I going to wake up in a few years time having achieved nothing with my life but a well-trained liver?
I feel stuck. I thought I'd have done more by now. Some of my friends are the editors of big magazines and copyrighters for fashion brands and designers of popular labels and international jetsetters, whereas I can barely save up a few hundred bucks by the weeks' end without blowing it all at Revolver on a Sunday morning. Last weekend the bartender gave me a free pot of cider - simply because my card declined. Now that's tragic.
Let's make one thing quite clear: I am twenty years old. Twenty-one in October. Sure, some people have their shit sorted out early - but those people are freaks. I am a youth-stricken post-adolescent with plenty of time, but despite knowing how much freedom I've got to explore and binge on sangria, there's still that listlessness that comes from not seeing an end game with any of the things I'm doing, and from having the motivation to tackle the things (read: the degree) I set my mind to when I was eighteen.
Then again, when I was eighteen and started my degree, the only nightclub I'd ever been to was IQ Thursdays, and I never fathomed at that point that I would wind up taking photos at clubs and bars every week for the next two and a half years. That just wasn't something I could see myself doing. Hell, I could barely stay up past five in the morning. If a potential one-night-stand wasn't interested by two in the morn, I was going home because fucked if I'm having it off with a total stranger when I could be passing out in bed over McDonalds and a movie by three instead. Now, though, it's "Good afternoon, family. It's one in the afternoon, and I'm going to bed. Forever. And no, I'm not on drugs. But don't look in my eyes."
That's when I realise that I've been feeling this for years, and it's not even my fault. I'm not even entirely to blame here, because I didn't do this to myself. We were taught this in primary school. We were taught this in high school. We're still having it fed to us like cattle being fattened up for the slaughter:
"Go to school, go to uni, get a degree, get a job, work-full time until you wind up married with children".
That's the natural process which we are forced to contend with. That is the measure of your success, and failing at achieving this list of expectations set out to us by society can cause - as I'm experiencing - a lot of discomfort and a feeling not at all unlike a mild midlife crisis. And the worst thing you can do to yourself is decide early on what you're going to do for the rest of your life, because before you know it, you're twenty years old lying in bed at four in the morning feeling completely unsure about what it is you should be doing with yourself, and whether or not you even like any of it at all.
The pressure to simply be a success is high and mighty, but unfortunately for those who laid their whole lives out in front of them before they'd had their first cocktail or STD, life doesn't always pan out the way you planned. I'm going to try and get my shit a little more together, while possibly putting down the yardstick I use to measure my life with. My skin might clear up, too, and my braces might fix my face faster, until I am a beautiful twenty-two-year-old with a magical jaw and perfect complexion - AND MY SHIT TOGETHER! (Not.)
I think I'll drop the subject. I'll acquire six credit points this year as opposed to seven or eight - but at least I'll feel a little more free to experiment with other areas of interest that I enjoy. I don't want to drop everything and sink into my mattress, because I sure as fuck want my degree. But I do want more freedom to explore my own head and what it is I actually want out of the next two or three years - because shit is forever changing, and if you don't agree with that, then you're an idiot who's probably well on the road to "stuck" too.
Sangria, anyone?
