When the clouds cleared and the plane completed its final descent into Atlanta my eyes teared up. I couldn't even see the houses and buildings for all the smog. I called my mom from the plane to let her know i landed ok, but had to cut my message short. I called Nikki to let her know I landed ok, but had to cut short our conversation. Talking about Atlanta was too disturbing.
When I walked out to the taxi stand at the airport, I noticed the difficulty of holding my shoulders straight, even after setting my bags down on the dingy sidewalk, in line with a bunch of yuppy businesspeople and watched by sullen minimum wage workers. I took deep breaths and thought about Vegas. The humidity here is suffocating me and so is graduate school.
the beautiful waters of the bellagio.
Nikki called and gave me some good advice, that she said was silly: god is smarter than me. I get so anxious, but how am i supposed to be able to control everything? I am seemingly incapable of just chilling the fuck out and letting it ride. I mean, how much worse would it be if i actually was responsible for everything in the world running smoothly? It's not my job. My job is to do the best i can with what I am given. So, ok.
Then my mom called and said pretty much the same thing, along with something like "and Nikki is a good person to learn from." Basically she was saying that we learn from pain, and I am in pain, and Nikki has been in pain, and I need to figure out how to get out of that. Then, I will be a better person because of the troubles I have experienced. I will be able to relate to people and even if I don't understand things, I have to have faith that it will get better. "What if it never does, though, Mom? What if this is as good as it gets?" She just told me it will get better. We agreed, you never know what is around the corner.
I guess, even if it doesn't get any better, it's still not for me to decide. I don't like giving up that power, or admitting that the power i think i have is an illusion. Mom said people come through her program every week (she is an executive leadership trainer) who are realizing all this, and maybe it's good that I'm going through it all now. So, basically, my mom told me I'm having the mid-life crisis that affects all rich white men in their 50s. Great. I almost wish I could have waited, as bizarre as that sounds, just so I could have all this other shit handled already. Although, if i had taken that social work job out of college and realized at 40 that I wanted to go to grad school, I would be pretty upset. Plus, I'd have house payments to make and kids to deal with. I don't know. I just don't know. Nikki says we think too much. She's probably right.
But my Mom and i did talk about Austin, and Mom is going to go with me. We're going to try to see a taping of Austin City Limits, although the process for getting tickets is a bit unpromising. It would be best if we could go to the Austin Music Festival, but that's in September (yes, right after my birthday, when I will be one year closer to retiring from a job I'm not yet qualified for) and I'm not sure we'll be able to pull it together in time. Plus she wants to go in the winter. I'll just be happy to leave Atlanta again, if only for a weekend.
in the meantime...
"Con Te Partiro (Time to Say Goodbye)"
performed by Sarah Brightman and Andrea Bocelli
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