Woe Is Me

Maybe it’s because I’m only a year away from 50.

Maybe it’s because I’m burned out.

Or maybe it’s because the Very Worst Season (summer) is upon us, and my brain is beginning to go into deep hermit mode. 

I started a new job this year, one I thought I’d love.

But I don’t. It’s not at all what I expected. Worse, I’m starting to dread it. That’s not how I want to live my life. I need a meaningful day job, one that makes me feel as though I’m making a difference. While this job has that potential, there are too many other issues hampering it (micro-managing, miscommunication, etc., etc.) and long story short, I need to find something else.

But what?

I started buying myself flowers because why the hell not?
I deserve them!

I’ve worked as a writer and editor for my “day job” for more than 20 years. And to be honest, I’d really like to try something else for the day job part of my life (I will always write my fiction - but one cannot make any kind of living that way).

Here’s what I’d really like to do: historical research. I’d love, love, love to be able to research anything from an old manor house’s history in the heart of England to the life of a previously neglected historical personage, or the history of an object or a document, or hell, just about anything.

Finding those types of jobs is like trying to find one ladybug hiding in a field of grass: nearly impossible.

Why is is that the things I love most do not pay? Why must my passions not allow me to make a living wage?

Granted, if I did not have to worry about health insurance in this god-forsaken country, I might be able to cobble together a living doing freelance historical research jobs. But nooooo…I am a human being with chronic health conditions and I need to have decent medical insurance. And I also need a steady paycheck, something that freelancers don’t get for a few years (if ever) while they establish themselves and gain clients. Growing up poor, watching my mother have panic attacks over money, also makes it impossible for me to not have a steady paycheck. Trauma is real, folks. 

What to do, what to do?

I’ve been scouring the jobs boards, looking for positions in publishing, but the jobs are competitive, and I don’t know that I want a job in publishing,. Therefore, I’m trying to open my mind a little to other types of work, but how do you get a job in another field when you’ve spent nearly your entire adult life in the same industry?

Whatever the job is, it needs to be a remote one because my health absolutely will not allow me to go back to an office full time. There are days I can’t leave my bed!

I’m trying to be patient and have faith that the universe will provide me an opportunity when the moment is right. But it is so hard.

And maybe all of this is because of the reasons I mentioned above: I’ll be 49 this year, and that’s one year closer to 50, and OH MY GOD HOW DID THAT HAPPEN? And as we just finished up Memorial Day Weekend, that means summer is upon us, and last summer nearly killed me. I swore I would go to the UK for a month to escape the heat, but I can’t do that because the job I have now WON’T ALLOW IT.

Or maybe I just need to get away for a weekend, go somewhere stimulating, and come home refreshed.

Woe is me indeed.

I am feeling sorry for myself, but this is very discombobulating. I've always known what I've wanted to do - write fiction - and working in the writing/publishing field for the day job has, in the past, been exactly what I wanted to do. Now that I'm having doubts about it, well...it's terrifying, I tell you. And I'd rather not go through another drastic life change! I already moved, started a new job, and broke up with my boyfriend. Can the universe just leave me alone for awhile?!?

Sigh.

One day at a time. I have to remember this.