a man without a plan

I've been worrying about success lately, because I know I'm on the wrong track to a corporate job with a suit, a tie, and a salary, where I'm respectable and reliable and have a week of paid vacation days to save up for something special. Something special. I imagine myself taking a week to relax in some stereotypical vacation spot like Hawaii or Florida or taking a cruise to the Caribbean so I can rest from work and I can even see myself enjoying it but then I realize I've forgotten that it was supposed to be something special. And then I wonder if I really want to succeed at all. At least I still have special occasions.

This was probably spurred by losing my very-much-an-in-between-jobs job, or maybe it was the conversation I had with my ex a few weeks ago. We both said we were happy and I think I meant it, but she's on a good track. It was seeing her so confident in both of us that did it, I think. "I'm glad everything's working out for you," she said. And was it? What was working out for me? Was anything going well besides myself? I'm single and unemployed--the difference between me and many other people is I'm happy about it.

So I wrote her an email because I was worried and she said "Maybe it's not about status. You just want to be happy--and you've succeeded at that."

Maybe, I said. I didn't say that there's a lot of things I didn't succeed at. Maybe she knows. Maybe success is all about pretending.