Senioritis: a delay, a reality check

Aqui y ahora, Ms. Beagan.

January is almost over, and January has been like a dream.
Que suenho!

So far, I have spent 2005 hovering between 3 inches and 3 feet above my body, just outside reality. I'm still physically in Chicago for the most part, but I have been behaving like I am not.

When you are so excited about the unknown just around the corner, it's a little hard to stay aqui y ahora. I feel like I did ten years ago, in January 1995 when I was a senior in high school and just SO done with both Coventry High School, and with Rhode Island in general. The months leading up to my September departure for college in Machias, Maine were spent in a haze of marijuana, disaffected adolescent malaise, and frequent escapes to Providence, Boston, or the beach.

And I'm guilty of the same behavior now, though I haven't been stoned in a while and I tend now to leave the country rather than the state for weekend adventuring. I have to admit, gentle reader, that I have been lazy at both of my jobs, just punching the clock and biding my time.

But it is NOT June yet. And dream though I may of flying away, I have to stay grounded and take care of what needs me. Thanks go out to JL, my maddeningly stable rock and voice of reason, for not giving me the vacation time to run off to Venezuela in three weeks. Financially it's not a good idea, and I really am needed at work right now. He suggested that I'll probably need a vacation more in April, and I can't help but agree. That's also his subtle way of telling me not to ask for any time off until then.

JL always reminds me to let reason, not emotion, lead me. He's right, and thanks to his influence I don't feel as prone to flights of irrationality as I used to be. But it's true, jaunting off to Venezuela or ANYWHERE right now is a bad idea. It's an emotional decision, not a rational one. I have bills to pay, I have things to do. I still live in Chicago and I still have responsibilities here.

And I need to remind myself of this when I'm sitting in a meeting, or in the office cafeteria; when conversation whirls around me, and I feel myself detaching, and rising up, and beginning to drift away just a little too soon.