Christmas Eve. The predicted high is 31 degrees or so, but I’m willing to bet it’ll get a bit warmer. A white Christmas is unlikely, but it bodes well for my weekend road ride. I can’t believe the weather (are you sensing a trend in the last few posts?) but I won’t question it. I don’t know if I’m ready for three or four hour rides on the rollers, and I certainly can’t run that long right now, so this is truly a blessing and I’d be a fool to not take full advantage of it.
This holiday season is mixed. On one hand, my personal life is going well and training is looking promising. I’ve got a good plan laid out and that fills me with confidence. Also, I’m already seeing good results and I’m not even five weeks in. On the other hand, finding work is tough. The bike shop has been slow since we haven’t had snow and nobody is really excited to buy skis. On top of that, adjuncts in MNSCU can only teach 10 credits during the academic year. Since I teach three credit classes I can really only teach nine credits, so next semester I’ll have one class instead of two. Currently, the only monthly income I can count on won’t even cover my rent and student loans, let alone car insurance, phone bills, food, gasoline, and other expenses. This is probably the first time in my life I’ve had to seriously worry about something like this and it does bother me.
People say you need to count your blessings, but it’s hard when survival is a legitimate worry. I have a few weeks to find more work, and I’m pursuing a few avenues, but it’s also discouraging to have a Masters degree and only be able to get work in grocery stores and restaurants. On the plus side, losing weight is easy with an empty pantry.
I know I’ll find something else. I can always give up my car and insurance and bike everywhere, and my cell phone really is a luxury. Email keeps me in touch with most people well enough. Sometimes I feel like things aren’t fair, or even just, and that with my degree I should have something by now. I worked hard and spent a lot of time studying and developing some really useful skills, but perhaps I just don’t know how to market myself properly. In the end, I tell myself that these thoughts are self-centered and naive. Nothing is fair, and you can never rest on your laurels. I worked hard for my degree and now I need to work harder for a job. It’ll mean more that way. I’ll really appreciate it.
I don’t want to work at Wal-Mart to pay off my student loans. But maybe I’ll have to. This isn’t how I planned things, but that doesn’t matter. You can never plan too far into the future if you have any hope of succeeding. I’m reading Solo Nanga Parbat, Reinhold Messner’s book about his 1978 solo ascent of the 8000 meter peak, and he writes over and over things that speak directly to me about the essence of what it is to live, and how one should live. As for plans he says:
I only plan ahead what is absolutely necessary. I believe in being independent–and that means I do not want to be dependent on my future.
In the solitude, Messner learns about necessity. So what is necessary? What do you need? What do I need? What is truly important? Honestly, I’m not sure. Could I give up my bike if I had to? Would I ever sell it to make ends meet? These sorts of questions have been racing through my mind. Unless my luck turns I face hard choices in the future, and I can’t count on having any sort of luck at all. The future looms in front of me, big as a mountain. Do I conquer it, or will I be conquered?
For a while Sean Kelly lived in an apartment without electricity or running water. He raced his bike hard, won enough money to stay alive. I would do this, but even poverty is a sort of luxury I can’t afford. I need to make money and pay back what I owe. I will. I’ll be alright. I’ll be alright.
