Sitting with Siddhartha...waiting

I used too much oil to clean my wooden desk today. It didn't even need it, just precautionary habit. But now, it's slimly and too slippery. Even my keyboard has a difficult time gripping the cherry surface. I have felt like this all day: unable to gain traction in my life. Students' papers trumpet to me from the living room, and all I can do it drift. A hazy mind, unable to navigate into a harbor and tie down.

What am I doing? Am I mimicking my mother for a sense of security, or is this something I really want? I love the intermitted jewels my job drops: the daily humor, the energy, the depletion thereof, the struggles, the epiphanies. But I am worn; a product of a "work as hard to not work" mentality prevalent in my generation. I constantly fight: pen in one hand, alibi in the other. Does God ever become so exhausted? Does a mother? Does my cousin, Martin, and his husband, Shawn? Does anyone who fights endlessly?

A dear friend of mine today talked about opening my own business. She taunted my inner workings. "Make your time your own...Open up your life...Give your writing the deserved time." It was delectably enticing. I licked my lips; but I did not bite. I do not have the self-discipline to run the show myself. I run a tight ship, but that's only because I am not the owner. I'm not even the investor, I'm just the captain in a fleet of many.

For now.