Saturday, April 3, 2010

with a bleak and violent future

in an episode of gilmore girls last night, rory had a mini panic attack about ending yale, saying that the future was a giant abyss and she had no idea what to do with her life when she finished. my cousin says, "she's so stupid. i couldn't wait to finish school." i tell her that she probably is excited to finish, but at the same time it's scary. i went through the same thing when i was finishing school last semester... probably not as bad though because a lot of "options" for my future really don't exist for me outside of my imagination because of familial/religious/cultural restrictions. but there was still anxiety about what to do next.

my cousin's great response to this, which i think was supposed to be comforting and reassuring, was, "well, when you finish you'll move back to jeddah and just sit at home for a few years until you get married. then you'll sit at your husband's home. or you could get a job if your dad agrees to it. you could teach computer or work at a hospital." she went on for a few minutes longer mentioning how we'd basically have their life, but that was where the panic starting to come in. i could feel my chest constricting and it becoming increasingly harder to breathe. i mean, i do not have any amazingly grand plans for the future, but being forced into a life of aimless visiting each other and gossiping (i realize this is nowhere near all they do, but it does take up a lot more of their time than i would like) is not something i will be looking forward to. i like to at least think that i have options, that i really can do whatever i set my mind to and all that other motivational crap they stuff into your head in elementary school. i mean, deep down i kinda know my future will be somewhere along the lines of what she said (at least the moving to jeddah part), but to have it said to my face point blank as if she wasnt dooming me to a life of nothingness was not nice. i want to do something meaningful with my life, and the picture she painted of my future included no meaningful accomplishments. nothing memorable. *sigh*

anyways, on a much happier note, we finally got around to weatherproofing the back deck a bit and setting up a table, shelves, and the pottery wheel so now there is a sort of ceramics studio out there which is totally awesome.

*Dance Party Plus - Head Automatica

2 comments:

  1. There's some leeway. I believe there's some leeway, for you and I both, and for the rest of the world. (This, my friend, is why hope is dangerous)

    This generation is either too responsible or too drastically amazing. I want to be on the drastically amazing side.

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