fists on up, it looks that easy

i'm playing life by ear until i go deaf from it.

i've never left it all to such chance. the catchphrase of the few months before i left for australia--"i'm just gonna figure it out as i go"--has turned into something entirely more formidable. and say what you will about my signs from, i don't know, the universe--the fact that the shoes i had to wear for the recently-quit job gave me gouge-like blisters and possible nerve damage in one of my big toes; the way that song came on my ipod this morning while i was writing my morning pages, and correlated so frighteningly with what i had just written down; etc and so on--but it seems life is always throwing me a hint that i'm onto something. i suppose it's a comfort.

like, i just started getting into "six feet under" and i've been powering through episodes to get to the series finale which promises to be the most devastating thing i've seen since "away from her," a movie that leaves me puddly-eyed just thinking about it sometimes. and it seems every episode i watch, when i watch it, connects with something i've been thinking about. there are characters in their thirties who have not pursued a career but have merely worked jobs, and claim to be happy at them. and in some strange combination of "artist's way" realigning, living in australia on the seat of my pants, and possibly a good old quarterlife crisis come a few years early, i'm thinking, "could i do that? could i get away with not ever having a career?"

if i don't start saving for retirement now, am i going to be one of those old people living in a dingy apartment somewhere with ugly curtains, old newspapers, and cat food for dinner every night? if i don't hop on a career track now, will i be left answering to these years of wandering and waiting tables until someone takes a chance on me? do i really think being a writer will actually pay some bills?

i suppose these are all rhetorical questions, and being listed for the sheer sake of keeping records. y'know, so i can look back in a few years and say, "boy, was i confused!" (don't be fooled; what i'm doing here is tossing off all these questions as just silly notions, and not the intense self-interrogation i've been doing on the couch all morning as i put off returning overdue library books again.)

oh, as it is friday morning, i should note i ended up not going in for that "dream job" at the cafe in the city, because let's be honest, i don't even know how to make instant coffee, let alone anything more complicated than sanka. on the plus side, the universe tossed me a literal sign in the window of a cafe/bakery in my neighborhood, and after a brief conversation with the harridan of a manager--who, if i get the job, god willing, i'm sure i'll have a hell of a time making like me--i now have a trial shift on monday. it's like a game of hopscotch lately.

so i'm a little "meh" today. i don't know, there's the fun and excitement of a life of uncertainty, of questions not quite answered and possibilities not quite known, and then there's just the fear that you're going to turn one of life's corners and walk into a punch in the face.

i reckon i could do myself some good by listening to my own advice from the last post, in recognizing that things do--or don't--work out for reasons that reveal themselves as the next page turns.

so i'm keeping my ear to the ground till then.