Crayons, coloring book, chalk, & drinks.

So let me see, yes this is a little confusing but for the most part I'm beginning to feel not overwhelmed so much as baffled. You see I'm starting to wonder where I’m heading in my life. In the last four years my life has changed so drastically that I feel as though I don't even remember who I used to be. I get together with my friends that I met only four years ago and we start to reminisce in what it used to be like and Oddly enough I was the one going out, partying, and staying out late. Let me put it to you this way I was the person you called on any given night to ask what was going on and where? If I was at a friends place it always managed to turn into a party or get together of sorts. Now don't get me wrong I'm not trying to be self-indulged but simply honest. My freshman year here I threw the biggest party that St. Ed's had seen. And, crazy as it may sound when I bump into someone from those days it never fails that I get asked "When are you throwing another party? Yours is still the best that I've been to."

Well I look at what my life is like now, and don't get me wrong it is a good life I have a great job, benefits, vacations, etc., but I have what you call a limited social life. The pay is good, the hours well I won't go there, the days that I work just completely out of the question most people wouldn't last here for a year and I'll be making my 2 year mark on the 27th of this month. I have become what I never wanted to become, all work and no play. I love to go out but what go out means to me now is not what it meant 4 years ago. 4 years ago it meant to a club or bars (underage, I knew most of the bouncers and managers on 6th) but now going out means to a theater show, Broadway show, museums, art exhibits, rollerblading, park, game nights, movies, green belt things of this nature much more simple and yet ten times more fascinating because you get something different every time. But like I said my social life has become very limited due to my work and school hours.

I work full time on Wednesdays - Saturdays from 7pm - 5am. Now let me ask you How many of you would like this work schedule if you were a young, single, college, female? Now school is not too much in the way a couple of classes here and there but nothing I can't handle. What is killing me is that the majority of anything good in Austin is happening during the hours that I work or sleep. You know it is very important to get sleep so yes I could sacrifice a few hours here and there but at the end of the week I just want to lock myself in my room and completely exile the world around me. That is why I take the time at least every couple of weeks to just soak in the bath tub in the dark with maybe a couple of candles burning and some Jazz in the background playing this is the only thing that keeps me sane week to week. The fact that I do exile the world around me for at least an hour every couple of weeks. But that is no social life. What I want is a social life time to go to a game or a show or a fishing trip my last real date happened about a year ago and it was one of the best that I have ever had. It was a night out to 6th street but not to club we went to a battle of the bands, a few local rock bands were playing and then afterwards a drive around town, then back to my place a couple of drinks and talking getting to know our past and our plans and then after about 2 hours of talking we went our separate ways and moved on with our lives. We stayed friends yes and we went out again but not on a real date like that night. Oddly enough that date was on a Monday night, why because of work.

You know a friend of mine who is 29 complained of this exact same thing but what he may not have realized was that with his line of work and mine, he was able to have a rotating shift and have weekends off from time to time, I on the other hand am stuck working the same days without end. And most people would say, you have nothing to complain about you have a four day work week the rest of us have a 5 or 6 day work week. Well yeah but they are short days, mine are long days and then I come home and have to do my everyday "house chores" clean, cook, laundry, bills, etc. And that all adds up and cuts down on your time to see friends and going out and if you take the time and add that in well then it cuts on your sleep time and that my friend will hurt you the next day at work when you have yet another 10 hour work shift. Most people think it's the same thing don't complain, but seriously try working 1 night from dusk till dawn rather then the other way around and I promise you, YOU WILL NOT KNOW WHEN YOUR DAY BEGINS AND WHEN IT ENDS.

I guess what I'm coming to is that There is more to life than work, I rarely get to see my family they all live at least 5 to 8 hours away from me so I can't just take a day to drive down to go see them. I have no real weekend and I've heard well you have Sunday's Yeah well YOU TRY GETTING OFF OF WORK AT 5AM SUNDAY AND THEN EITHER 1) STAYING UP TO GO OUT, OR 2) FINDING SOMEONE TO GO OUT WITH THAT NIGHT THAT DOES NOT HAVE WORK OR CLASSES ON MONDAY.

So where did all this come from well about two hours ago I was here in the office telling my friend/coworker how I wanted something to play with either crayons and a coloring book, chalk board or dry erase board something I was just so excited and happy that I wanted something childish and fun to do. Well I then get a text message from a friend asking if I wanted to go drink with him after work at 5AM. Then I hear from another friend that he is going to a show and that just sounded so much better then going to drink at 5am. What is crazy is that 4 years ago it would have been the complete opposite. Crazy as it may sound I just may have grown up in the last 4 years. But yet I still want to go back to those days where I'm laying on my stomach coloring Mickey Mouse pages.

PurpleFuel