Commence Breakdown

How many things would be different if I didn't care about what others thought of me? I'd probably still be fat, but I guess I wouldn't care? That'd be nice. Today I wore a skirt I've owned for five years that's a size above my jeans. My hips were barely contained by its delicate seams; my stomach pudged over its edges, creating soft pink lines that are currently being nourished by my underwear (not panties because 1) gross word, and 2) panties don't come in my size). Aside from the fatness, I've been seriously thinking about my life and how much it would be different if I weren't constantly imbuing everyone around me with negative thoughts about me...Perhaps I should ponder my life without its egocentricity.

Specifically, if people's perceptions didn't matter to me, would I be a teacher? Some days I hate it; other days it's so exhilarating that I am stunned into a semi-permanent smile. Every day I am tired. Every day I think about getting out. Every day I feel trapped. There is no getting out. Because I am supposed to be a professional. Women fought for eons to obtain the jobs and degrees I want to snub my nose at in favor of something so-far intangible (but probably involves tv, free time to work out, and lots of day dreaming). I'm trapped because I am in Cleveland for the duration. Setting aside the husband who managed the job of his dreams, I have a fractured family that would haunt me wherever I went if I ever were to go away. A large part of me feels like I would be happy if I quit my job and worked a low-stress, low - prestige job. But, of course, I wouldn't. I'd immediately set to becoming a manager or starting my own thing, all the time lengthening my 30 minute lunches to 45, 60, 80 minutes. I have to wonder how much my urge to get ahead and be in charge has to do with the fact that I've decided people expect me to do just that. Probably no one gave a shit that I worked as a legal assistant at a law firm, but in my head I had reason to be deeply ashamed.

The job was super easy, interspersed with incredibly stressful days, and paid more than I'm making two years after my Master's. Yet I felt the need to leave because I hated telling people what I did. I have friends who are lawyers, for christsake. So I went back to grad school and became the only viable thing I felt capable of becoming: a high school English teacher. And now, not only am I just a teacher, but an unhappy one at that. If my family's predicament has taught me anything, it's that we do not have infinite amount of time on earth to be happy, even if we're technically alive. So why am I at a job that makes me terminally stressed?

Perhaps because the only other jobs I'm qualified for involve name tags and time cards. And frakkin hell, that wouldn't make me happy either.