Hi, Wednesday. Nice day in the MIA and Khan just got a great report from the Vet, so happy for that, though he is a bit overweight, poor little dear. Is it wrong to find him so cute when he's a bit fattier and fluffed? Apparently the dude gets too many treats, and now needs to eat celery so he can be a little waif of a dog and fit into his vintage Hedi Slimane suit. Bah.
Anyway, you may be wondering why I titled today's post "What am I doing"? I called it such because I'm not sure what the hell I am doing in 6 am spin classes, working like a complete pyscho all the time, dabbing in a million creams and potions in the hopes of a glowy complexion, and leaving very little time for anything called "life". And then I begin to wonder what the hell any of us are doing- it appears to me that we just can't stop- can't shut off, can't wind down, can't just chill. Maybe I've begun to feel uncomfortable in this Type A uniform, when really I am more Type D or E. Clearly I'm acknowledging I may be batting for the wrong team. I sometimes think I'm kidding myself with this superhuman level of devotion to everything but what I really want to be doing, which is chilling out and enjoying myself and having some bloody fun. Yes of course, I have to work like the rest of you people, but maybe if I was not so career obsessed, I would have a little more time for some of the things in life that make it worth living?
And in typical Gen X fashion, I have always felt that the generations before us fucked us royally, in every possible position you can imagine. I'm not saying this is accurate, I'm just saying that for Gen X types, we've always wanted to give the middle finger to the Woodstock and disco generations for bringing, in our mind, terrible scourges like AIDs, diminished social security stockpiles, and a phobic obsession with health in general. And don't think for a minute that many of us girls have not had at least a passing thought about how different things would be without bra burnings, Betty Friedan, and Gloria Steinhem. Insanely grateful for the efforts of these feminist pioneers, but now harried women across the world are trying to figure out how to have it "all", which I'm not sure is even really possible- how in the world are we doing it all anyway and at what price our lives? Cut to today.
As I sleepwalk my Type D or E ass to the gym at 5:45 am, I can't help but notice the complete influx of boomer types, fit as fiddles yet grey at the temples, smoking me on my spin bike and bench pressing the weight equivalent of a small village. Yea yea, it's great boomers are not as old as generations before, but why do they have to ruin life for the rest of us, who may look forward to one day being just "old" and happy and not feeling the need to spin to "Empire State of Mind" before the sun is even up? What happened to old people being old? Can I not even look forward to that? Am I going to have to be in better shape at 65 than I am now? Jesus Christ. Yet again, it's no longer enough just to age- anow all of us can no longer look forward to early bird dinners and mah jjong, but tortured sessions with despotic trainers and sprints around the park, accompanied with a frantic eye on our sugars, lipids, and cholesterol. I know this is all terribly important, but feels so damn daunting, especially when I picture old age as chilling on a park bench, a bit mad in the head, drinking wine, reading lots and lots, and finally relaxing after years of rabid self obsession.
I am only half kidding, really, and may not be kidding at all but am afraid you will all think me an insensitive, sluglike, lout for saying such things. But this 24/7/364 NOW NOW NOW FIT FIT FIT ORGANIC ORGANIC ORGANIC GO GO GO MAKE IT HAPPEN YESTERDAY I RULE I WIN I TRIED HARDER THAN ANYONE existence is annoying the (organic) crap out of me. I guess what I am saying is the pressure to always be perfect, right, and on point is disastrously boring, and a life of vices and laziness is surely more entertaining. I'm just sleepy in the brain with trying to succeed (whatever that means), and fighting things like aging, my natural tendency to want to just chill, and my insatiable need for things that are not so fantastic for me. At what point did we all become such robots and control freaks that we can't just let it go sometimes? Does the two weeks you get to take off a year really solve this problem or does it merely lull us into a quiet submission? I think not, and I can't think of a solution either other than to throw my hands up once in a while and ask "what am I doing?" as a way to check in with myself and acknowledge how ridiculous I have become, at least in my eyes. Because no matter what, at the end of another nerve wracking day ending in some organic dinner, I am still just me, and you are still just you, and no amount of roasted kale, quirky title change to your current position, or amount of upside down pole dancing class is going to change that. It may change things superficially sure, but deep down I know I can be happy without all of the above. Since when did we, as a society, become so g-ddamned responsible? Maybe I need to amend what I said above about my boomer thing- it's not that I'm pissed at them, I just wish we too could have enjoyed the reckless abandon of Studio 54, or the three martini lunch a la Mad Men. Who took the FUN out of everything? Everybody knows you technically feel better when you are in shape, "fulfilled" at the office, and eating your vegetables- so why does it feel like such servitude to get there? (If all the pain is worth it as they say, where does that leave us hedonistic, pleasure seekers? Give me pleasure over pain any day).
And when do we simply acknowledge that there is great beauty (and wisdom) in imperfection, so can we stop being so dang atelophobic and hang a little further back in the pack if we are so inclined? There's no shame in not always winning the race, you know. It's more about staying in it, the best you can.
I acknowlege that my usually sunny tone is not in evidence today, and for this I apologize. I promise to channel my happy place in the very distant future. But once in a while I have to check in with a giant heaping WTF and wonder what happened to our society and their obsession with being so "uber" all the time. Perhaps I should move to Europe? Would that help? Or maybe even Jamaica? I'm bored with everything else. Today I'm just not so interested in being the best, but merely just being the best I can. Or furthermore, more BEING and less DOING. Cause that's what's up this make it stop of a Wednesday in the MIA, and that's that. XO