August 31st 2014
Sun 31 August 2014
Last day of leave, and a day of normalcy and domesticity. Mainly hung around and enjoyed the last of the days since the end of June, when I last went near work. Tomorrow will see some hectic times, when I figure out what's happened while I've been away. If I've been doing it right, very little! The best work disappears, as they say.
These few months off have given me a bit of time to think about larger things -- I've gotten a lot of stuff done, and have thought about a lot more stuff. My brain has not been terribly healthy these last few years, and part of what I hoped to figure out was what I might end up doing (or not doing) to make it be a little healtier. I had a couple of bad signs, like mood swings that weren't linked to any external stimuli, that mean I may end up seeing a professional again at some point. However, on other fronts things are a lot better.
For one, I've finally acknowledged that I'm actually not made happy by being lazy. The last proper frame of reference I had with enough time to introspect on it was college and soon after, where I could do stuff like spend a week playing Baldur's Gate, or similar goofing off. I often stressed myself out in recent years because I don't seem to get the time to do that sort of thing any more. However, given the opportunity to do so, I found myself not really able for it - the thought of not doing something productive, or not doing something at least worthwhile outweighed the stress for not being able to goof off (if that makes sense). So tl;dr: The marathon laziness sessions I get stressed about not doing are actually bad for me when I get to do them. I don't like them. The reason in my head, at least, seems to be that the part of my brain that wants things is a bit disconnected from the part that enjoys experiences and feeds back. It also probably means that I did some growing as a person without really noticing. So, I got to rationalise away a source of stress :-)
For another: this leave almost acted as a catalyst for realising what I'm going to do, ever, and what I'm not going to do. For a long time, I've had in the back of my brain "Someday I'll do X", where X is a thing that's completely possible for me to do now. Someday I'll go travel in a particular place. Someday I'll learn a particular skill. It'll happen in the empty space that I can retionalise away as "When I have time off work". I just had time off work, and only got one or two of these things done (the motorcycle thing, and some other social things I may go into later). Now that I'm back at work, I realise: there is no later. Unless you're prepared to make a long list and wait for retirement (and hope you make it in one piece and are able-bodied enough to tick them off) you're just not going to do these things. You sweep them away forward into a fold in time, which usually means 'never'. So, if I find myself going "I'd like to do X sometime when I've time", the time is now. Or soon. Make plans.
I've been extraordinarily lucky in my work life - I have a job I love doing, that pays well and is flexible about lifestyle. I have a Significant Other that is the world to me, and that I want to share my life with if I can. I have most of my life left to make of it what I can. The last thing I need is self-denial and some-other-time'ism holding me back. I need to keep that in my head as I get back into a routine, so it doesn't become too routine.
Of course, if I could find my work ID, this would all be a lot more straightforward.