Apathy is not a particularly familiar feeling for Type A's. I'm not sure where mine came from, but it has this heaviness to it that makes me feel that it will stay a while. I stopped therapy a little while ago after 15 years, so perhaps that's got something to do with it. I've also just had some pretty mean surgery, so my system is sluggish and inward-focused. Or maybe its origin is less profound. Maybe I'm tired and sick of this self-inflicted treadmill I run on every day, convincing myself that I am full, when in fact I am full of shit, too chicken to do anything differently.
I got my first job when I was 11. I entertained children's parties and charged R70 per party. I entertained 4 parties a month. R280 was good money in 1987. In high school, I waitressed (worst fucking job on the planet), gave pedicures (still, waitressing is worse) and taught Maths and English. I was good at teaching, and aside from the occasional Little Shit, I loved it. It paid really well and mostly, during my teens and early twenties, I earned more than my largely unemployed father. I worked through varsity, held down two jobs during business school and never even considered a Gap Year. I have taken 5 months off work in my whole life: 1 to set up a business and learn French; 2 months for each baby. That's it.
When you have a job, you can ask for a month of leave. When you're a consultant, you can ramp up or down at your will. But when you run a business and you have salaries to pay and staff to keep motivated and busy and clients that know the buck stops with you, the best you can get is a week to recover from surgery and still, I had one client call me just before I was wheeled into surgery asking if we could just 'run through a few things.' Um. How about you run through the fucking traffic? (what I should have said, but unfortunately the pre-med numbed my nerves)
I just crave a little stillness; the kind of stillness that Type A working mothers never let themselves have. We clutter and cram our lives until we can barely breathe, and somehow, that manic feeling becomes more and more addictive and we become more and more disconnected from our spirits, our purpose, the people that matter and our happiness.
And then, like all good self-flagellating freaks, we hate ourselves for it.
Right now, I am loathing myself for not spending enough time with my second son, for not having dinner parties, not exercising enough, not reading enough, not writing enough, not taking supplements regularly, being judgmental of my mom, not visiting my husband's gran when I should and not doing enough charity work (3 things this month alone, but still feel like it's never enough). I also think my garden looks like shit and it's my fault and that I really, seriously should have learned another language by now. I hate that I am not focused at work. That I haven't put a photo in an album since 2009. That my car is always always a mess. And that I have no other interests but my kids and my work, which means I am two-dimensional and expected.
And I hate my hatefulness because it makes me seem ungrateful and I have so much to be grateful for.
Tomorrow morning, I am going to wake up and just be grateful. And present.
And I'll take it from there.
