Yep! That’s the question of the day. I get almost no emotional or spiritual utility from the common actions of my daily life. I am well aware that my wife is in the same quandary. Both of use are often faced with the question, what is the point of life, why are we working this hard to feel this Blegh?
So, the question is why are we working so hard, and killing ourselves for something (this life) that neither of us actually enjoys on a regular basis?
Have you recently woken up and wondered where your time went, or where your childhood went, or where anything else went? For me it was the satisfaction I am getting out of life, and I suspect (judging from the power of these feelings) that this is what drives men to the mid-life crisis state that is so touted in modern comedy and other forms of entertainment.
Men who never learned to think, who never learned to understand their own drives, would be prone to making rash decisions, buying that 1976 Charger, or the Porsche, or in extreme cases, running away from the family and starting over with the 20 something year old mistake.
Luckily I don’t like Chargers or Porsche, and I’m already married to the drop-dead sexy pretty young blonde, so all that’s left is to understand why I’m not feeling contented on a daily basis.
First. There’s the stress of the kids.. and then the stress of renovations, and then vehicles, housework, work-work, schoolwork, and on and on and on…
Ok, granted, being a father of five (two under five and we’re thinking maybe one or two more), as well as tangentially the father of a 20 year old who’s obvious preference is the metropolis where his mother lives, in addition to being a student, a writer (only kinda) and a full time self-employed accountant, is naturally going to take a toll on the reserves of any one man, and it’s given mine a hit as well.
But that’s not the real problem. I thrive on the pressure, until I need a break that is. The problem is that while I enjoy the challenges, the rewards have become intangible at best and irrelevant at worst.
I like playing with my boys. I like puttering in the shop, fixing the motorcycles, building small projects like the deck out back, but when I spend 98 percent of my time merely scrambling to compensate for things that won’t stay finished, and it’s always to settle things down so that I can get some other work done, why am I doing that?
I ask myself a question, daily. Why am I still here? We live on an amazing planet, and I dream of sailing off into the sunset, really I do, so why am I landlocked 1000 miles from the sea, and a lifetime away from anything new in this world?
I”ll leave it there for now. I know this post hasn’t been educational, but I’m more philosophical today. So sue me.
Dan.