Oh

Just had the job interview from hell. Fucked it up in about as many ways as it's possible to fuck something up. Walked in there already knowing I wasn't properly prepared and didn't have a clue what I was doing.

Still have no job. Everything they told me at the last place seems confirmed. I'm crap at this.

Here I am, 42, no job, no career, no skills, been a while since I was any good at anything.

I used to have such grandiose arrogant dreams. I really thought I was something. Why did I think that? What was it based on?

I have lovely children. I might not conform to some people's ideals of what a mother should be, but they are gorgeous and happy and I can take some credit for that.

This is what happens. The "job for life" is a dwindling concept. Many of us arrive on this pebbled-and-cold East England beach with no idea of how we got here or where we're going next.

Most of us don't achieve our dreams.

Consoling? Or depressing.

I finished reading a book yesterday. With hindsight it was not the best book to be reading. I was avoiding the failure of not having the ability to prepare well for today's interview. The book was gripping, and well-written, and I wanted to know the fate of characters that had wormed their way into my thoughts. The ending was bleak, pessimistic, and very sad. I cried a lot, and suddenly I wasn't just crying about a young boy's suicide. I was crying because I'd fucked up.

The book was written by a friend of mine. She had her first book published at the same time as me. She got the deal I narrowly missed, or so I used to think. Her publisher gave me an encouraging "We like you, but..." rejection just as they signed her up. Our books were similar. We were similar. But she's better than me. I don't have what it takes, in talent or commitment.

I'm just not good enough.

But most of us aren't.

Here we are, not halfway through but already over the hill and slumping down the other side, muttering and sighing and nursing our aches and pains, blaming everyone/everything else for the sheer bloody fact that hope, dreams, energy, creativity... none of it lasts. And it dies with a horrible speed.

Ignore me. I have these lurches. I'll be chipper and perky and annoying again tomorrow. What can you do except look forward? Even if it's not as shiny as it once was, it's still there in front of you. Pulling you along, because time has no sympathy and no interest in your moans.

achey-smiley

I was wondering the other day, whatever happened to my creativity?

I'm not writing anything and I'm mostly not that bothered. I don't feel the urge to write, and when I do... well, it's hardly jaw-dropping.

Life, I guess. Not true for everyone, I know, but I don't think having kids has helped.

Still. I've been asked to sing a song of my choosing at choir on Monday. I utterly failed to write anything new (not that they were expecting me to, but it would have been nice), but did manage to write some nice harmonies and new words for something I wrote ages ago. Quite looking forward to that actually - hearing the whole choir sing sumfink wot I rote. What was I saying? Oh yes, I'm not very creative at the mo. Oh.

Anyway. This blog has no bite and no edge. I apologise for that, but any kind of solution seems beyond my reach. I've gone soft in my old age.

I ran ten kilometres this morning. My legs ache. It made me cry, all those women with their messages to dead, dying and not-dying loved ones taped to their backs. But they were all cheerful and wearing pink, so it was fine.

I might write more about it later. First I have to vacuum floors. The Chinese teenagers go home tomorrow. We'll miss them. We like them. We have a new batch arriving on Thursday. I've become a housewife. But I still can't cook. They don't think much of our food (they pretend they do, but they obviously don't) and I can't really blame them.

still here!

Hello,

Thankyou to the kind person who enquired how I was - I am fine! Just busy. We have Chinese teenagers staying with us at the moment - we are playing host family to Chinese pupils over here for a summer camp - and I have some short term agency work which is keeping me busy (especially as I have to cycle nine miles to get there every day). Still no permanent job, which is a worry as the agency work will end in a couple of weeks and there's no prospect of any more. But there you go. Oh, and my computer has broken (and I can't afford a new one), so I'm not on the internet so much. Apart from that I'm quite enjoying the summer, and looking forward to more summer niceness.

This weekend I'll be running the 10k Race For Life. Sadly my training programme fell by the wayside when I got this agency work, but I'm cycle 18 miles most weekdays, so I figure that must be helping. I'm a teensy bit worried about my poor knees, but I daresay they'll cope (Note to self: do knee exercises).

And then on Sunday it is Birthday Barbecue time, for me and the littl'un, so that should be fun.

Summertime, and the living is easy...