Uncertainty

How to deal with uncertainty. I am not sure. I spend my life teetering on the edge of a deep, dark place. Sometimes I am several steps away. I know it’s there but I’m not forced to look at it day after day and I pretend it’s gone. Other days I stand at the edge, unable to tear my gaze from the depths. Today is one of those days. I imagine the sensation of falling into that hole is how I feel right now. Utterly and completely out of control, unfocused, at the mercy of fate. I’m not even sure there is a bottom to the hole, and that terrifies me most of all. The idea that one could simply fall and fall and fall, never reaching the ground. For at least the ground would mean you’ve stopped. There would be certainty. The journey would be over. But when I look into the dark there is no final resting place. It’s never ending despair, an unbreakable cycle.

 So back to my question: how does one deal with uncertainty? With lack of control? With being trapped? That’s what pushes me towards the edge. Relationships, pressure, weather, bad living situations. I have all of those now. Obligations to people that I wonder if I even about. Playing the long game when all I want is to up and leave. What makes us happy in the long-term? It’s a question that haunts and torments.

 She wakes up. It is dark and outside it is snowing yet again. Jamie sleeps soundly beside her, having turned away in the night. The alarm will go off soon. Then they will get up, head into the office where they both work. She will sit in her office with the space heater blasting. There are no windows so she texts Jamie for updates on the weather. Her boss will call periodically, wanting this or that, always ASAP. The first time it is information she provided to him previously, the second time it’s something that doesn’t exist, and the third time he wants confirmation on a made-up number. This is her job, manipulating data and she is very good at it. Sometimes when she disagrees too much with what her boss wants she pretends the data doesn’t work. He yells, but is convinced he needs her so she is not worried about losing her job. It makes her miserable. Sometimes she wishes she would be fired. In his office he occasionally touches her on the leg, in a manner that is overly familiar. He knows she is with Jamie, after all that’s how Jamie got the job. He pays her well and for the past two years she has scrimped and put as much as possible towards her crushing debt. Despite this, she needs at least another two years of this before it’s gone. Before she is free. In the evening she will go home and hide in the bedroom to avoid the endless thumping from the upstairs neighbors. She wants to run, but Jamie is tired and soon it is too late. She is frustrated. Another day wasted. Trapped by a shitty job, lousy apartment, and relationship that makes her feel guilty and she has to constantly deal with Jamie’s insecurity about everything on earth.

She’s decided to leave everything. The apartment requires three months notice so she puts that in and tells her boss that’s it. No amount of debt is worth this. Jamie can take it or leave. She can’t handle being the strong one for everyone all the time. With or without a job she can survive. It may set her back but it’s always made her more flexible and interesting. She needs change. Maybe take a couple months off to bike across the county. Maybe just hide out somewhere. She will make it work. This is life and she wants to live. She is shoving everything pushing her towards the edge aside. She won’t be boxed in, even if it’s harder it’s her choice, her world. The uncertainty of a decision you make is better than the uncertainty of being in one place and wondering if it will improve.