My parents don’t understand. Which would be fine and good, but I need their support else I’m going to stay in the situation I’m in.
My mom likes to compare me to my dad, who to my knowledge had two major breakdowns between the ages of 18 and 68. TWO! I’m 34 and I’ve had at least three. My dad never had to take medication in childhood, didn’t spend the first two decades of his life feeling without connection, without belonging. Further benefit; my dad was able to join the Air Force and come out with an honorable discharge. Which meant he had no college debt, and job skills from his time served.
By the time my dad was my age he’d had a job that paid enough to support a family, and it lasted. I’ve yet to hear my dad talk about the times when his employer came into the room, and on a near yearly basis, “I’m sorry, the economy has taken a downturn, and we have to cut the dead weight.” That’s how my career has gone, being told that through no fault of my own, I’m disposable. I don’t think it’s fair to expect me to bounce back, hit after hit, trauma after trauma.
What kills me about it is they are trying to be supportive, and that’s supposed to be a good thing. It appears to me they are much more willing to believe in an employer that allows workers to get sick, or have personal problems. That isn’t the market these days. I told my mom what I’d like; I’d like to be a union factory worker in a Ford plant in the 1960s. Why? Because before the economic downturn I could work enough years to get a good pension. When I retired, my body would still work. I could have the dream American family of 4 kids, white picket fence, safe neighborhood.
If these things are still out there, they aren’t here, I can’t find them. I want to like my coworkers enough to go bowling after work once a week, that kind of loving supportive environment. No one my age bowls to my knowledge, who has the time or emotional energy?!
She wants me to go work at a golf course for a month. That really nails how little she understands about how I feel about our society. Golf courses are symbolic of rich people who don’t have to give a damn about anyone else, that’s how rich they are. I understand now what an adventagious position that is, and I also understand that being born into a dynasty is the only way someone my age gets into that culture.
I can’t find peace as a serf, a debt slave with no pension, no vacation, no sick leave. I would rather be homeless, and I think that is such a divergent thought that most people can’t understand it. I tried, really hard, and supposedly with great intellect. What now? I’m out of willpower to try and make it work. So I want to quit, maybe focus on community matters, become a PTA dad, coach soccer, find meaning elsewhere than the job market, which only has an interest in using up what little health and ability I have left.