the spareness of my time

I've decided to chill out a little.
Because, honestly, what is the point?
I'm trying to think a little more about what I want, and after watching Mona Lisa Smile yesterday afternoon, I currently feel I want to be a hot, bohemian professor, and have trysts with Italian professors at romantic cabins somewhere in New England.
In the meantime, how much should I really care about any job I might have to pay the bills?

Let's say my philosophy has changed a little. A job may not merit attachment at all, because a job doesn't actually promise to be there for the long haul. My friends and family are stable and important, and in many ways my passions and ultimate goals are stable and important, but employment? Employment deserves exactly no more of my attention than the hours I am paid for, and any job deserves to be dropped the second you find something better, or the second it stops being what you need it to be.
This is something I wished I had realized a few months ago, when I first asked myself if I might find a better place than Tutta Bella to work at, a place with more customers and more tips.
I could have had a head start. But they had convinced me to be loyal, and silly me, and thought that loyalty went both ways.
Loyalty or not, the basic realities of money can sometimes trump all. I could have made the decision first, and I wish I had.

I wish I would have had a little more foresight; or actually, I wish I would have trusted my intuition in thinking that the over-staffing and under-tipping of this new restaurant could not go on forever. Lesson learned. And really, it was fun while it lasted.

As far as looking for a new job, I've decided January is a harsh month to try to do it, so I'm not going to obsess over it. If I find the right thing, awesome. If it takes a while, well, I guess I will enjoy my extra free time. The modern economy is not designed to be stable, but should that be my problem?

the current confusion.

Today was when it hit me:
I have no job and no direction, and I don't know what the hell I am supposed to do with my life.

Partly, I feel intensely frustrated with how the modern world works, how nothing ever feels secure in the world of employment and money. Partly, I know that if I only work for money, I will always be dissatisfied.

And partly I wish I could move away from the city and learn how to throw pottery, and sell it from a tent at craft shows, and live in a cabin in the middle of nowhere with a lot of books and a dog. Because that just sounds like peace.

Sometimes, I feel I have no idea what my 'gifts' are, and how I am supposed to use them, and how that could actually be beneficial to the world.

Sometimes, I miss the structure of school, the assignments turned in and the comments received back. I hate the feeling, out here in the real world, that you are doing something wrong, but you don't know what it is and no one will tell you. I feel like the heroine of the Moviegoer. Just tell me what to do, exactly, and reassure me I can do it, and afterwards tell me I did well. I am a product of public education and that's the only way I function.

But the truth is, this is the point at which I am the one who decides what I should do, and I am the one who judges whether I've done it well. Currently, I feel rather inept at both.