Behind

I am sitting on my couch with my feet to on my ottoman. There is a pain running up the side of my shin. I took over 10,000 steps today. I was a substitute intermediate school librarian, which you wouldn't think would result in a lot of walking or A lot of shin splints but here we are.

Today was better. It was better because I was busy, because I was serving, because I was with children, because I didn't have time to be in my head.

Yesterday my school district, where my kids go, where I sub, called every family in the district urging everyone to come in and interview for teaching jobs. Teaching jobs I don't think I actually want, that I'm not sure I'd be able to handle, but that I deeply resent other people leapfrogging me to get. That I am afraid of missing out on, afraid of losing. Afraid of getting. Afraid of not getting.

I am doubting all the life choices that led me here, the years of mothering that left me behind, left me with no resume, no confidence, no marketable skills. I'm sad and I'm scared and I'm angry and I'm resentful and I'm filled with regret. 

I really shouldn't wait until 11 to write these

 It is 11:00 at night. I'm curled up in a corner of my couch. YouTube comedy videos are playing on my TV but I'm not entirely watching them. I have to be up at 6:00 am to get my kids off to school. My coffee pot is already set up. I should probably be in bed already. But I'm not.

I have been spending the past few days looking at writing jobs and online teaching jobs and curriculum design jobs. I tried to learn more about freelance writing and copywriting and content marketing and virtual assistanting (I'm not sure that last one is a verb, but PARALLEL STRUCTURE) I made a few things for my teachers pay teachers store and tried to promote them. 

And I've come to the conclusion that everything sucks and I hate it all. I don't want to do anything. I'm not already good at anything and I don't want to be bad at everything. 

I've never been anything but a teacher and a mom, and I am afraid I'm too old to learn to be anything else. I'm afraid I'll never be able to choose anything or commit to anything. I'm afraid I'll just be rejected at everything and it will SUCK SO HARD and I DON'T THINK I CAN HANDLE IT. 

I don't know anymore. It's 11:20 at night and I should already be in bed but when I wake up I don't know what I will do. Well. I know I'll put my kids on the bus, but beyond that I really just don't know.

I'm not sure this went anywhere or that I said anything but it's 11:20 at night, and this is what you get.

10 things my gremlins say at 11:43 at night

1. You didn't do anything that matters today.
2. You will never create anything that anyone cares about.
3. Everyone but you had something better to do today.
4. No one would notice or care if you just disappeared.
5. You don't have anything to say, anything to write, anything worth adding to the world.
6. No one wants to talk to you and they're relieved when you don't reach out.
7. All your best work is behind you.
8. You quit everything you start and honestly it's just as well.
9. You disappoint people.
10. You'll never be enough. 

Substitute

 I am sitting in someone else's chair, at someone else's desk, in someone else's classroom. In 4 minutes, her 3rd graders will come back from gym and I will teach them compound sentences with her slides and her lesson plans. 

In front of me on my desk - her desk - is my green travel mug of coffee from this morning. In the bottom of this cup, there are only a few drips of cold, stale coffee I made at home 7 hours ago. Still, in these last 4 minutes of my prep - HER prep - I repeatedly raise this cup to my lips, letting the bitter drops fall into my mouth. 

And in these last few minutes, I scribble in my notebook. I scribble about how my 12 year old daughter is writing 50,000 words this month and I can't. I write about diagramming sentences. And as I grasp at the last few bitter drops of creativity  still in my brain, I realize that none of that can substitute for making something that's mine.

More

 Both of my kids are in school. In school in person. Not here with me. Not doing reflex math in my lap. Away.

I have time to myself. Time to do whatever it is I want to do with my life. I just don't know what the heck that is.

I know it's not laundry. I know it's not decluttering. I know it's not watching Schitts Creek for 6 hours a day.

I don't know what it is that I want.  All I know is that I want more.