When I decided to write this blog today, I got so excited that I sprinted up the stairs to retrieve my laptop. I was in a moment of pure exhilaration, when bam, reality hit me, nay tripped me. I ate absolute shit, left to ponder my mortal existence as I lay sprawled out on the very, very hard wooden steps. I heard my mom, dad, and sister call up to me cautiously from down below.
"Dude, are you okay?".
"Yeah", I groaned, " Those stairs came out of nowhere".
Did it feel like the world was trying to humble me? It did. Although, I'm not quite sure why, since the circumstances of my life are enough to keep absolutely anybody is a constant state of humility. At the ripe age of 22, the most exciting part of my week is catching up on soap operas with my parents every Friday, and driving to Dunkin with my sister (a five minute excursion, maximum). Sure, I text my friends so much they probably wish they could block me, I watch enough TV to create my own wikipedia database, and I browse Linkedin like there will be a job called "Alex Hillenbrand's Perfect, Creative Endeavor". As, I peeled myself off the stairs and cradled my laptop in my arms, I realized I had not a moment to spare. If I didn't follow the momentum of my mind, this idea would never see the light of day, and I would have become a Personal Finance writer, practically equivalent of piercing my favorite English Professor in their Shakespearean-encrusted heart.
My mom has been telling me to write a blog ever since I told her I wanted to be a writer. Okay, mom, we get it you're always right, no need to gloat about it. In the meantime, can you put Cottage Cheese on the grocery list, Tik Tok told me it will make me have a Hot Girl Summer. People often ask me if my mother is the author of "Seabiscuit", and I almost always go along with it just to see how much research they'll do about my family. In truth, she's a major girl boss in corporate America and is probably so confused how she raised a daughter without a singular serious bone in her body, unless it comes to a disease I've diagnosed myself with or my love of Taylor Swift. On Friday's, she has become my new drinking buddy, and I've moved from the jagerbombs of day's past to a crisp Sauvignon Blanc. I have to say, I can't complain about the upgrade.
My dad once wrote a blog during what I believe to have been some sort of a mid life crisis. Just kidding, it was actually a pretty good blog, or at least I believe it must have been. I never read it, but that's only because it was about advice for those working in Corporate America, and I can promise you that is a career path that would leave me balding with worsened acid reflux. Not that he's bald, or has acid reflux, that's just my own personal prediction. Leave him alone, he has a very luscious 2 centimeters of hair! He also has a very unique name that often makes people think they're friends with him from the second they meet him. Otto was named after his father. My mom, Mary was named after her mother. My grandpa, George, had a son that he named George, that had a son named George. My family is full of incredibly humble, non-narcissistic people!
Otto and Mary, my new, old roommates think it's pretty neat that I want to be a writer. But bless their hearts, they also want me to "get a fucking job so we can take you off our payroll" . To be fair, I am past when they expected they would have to financially support me. After all, twelve year old me did claim I was going to Harvard and becoming a Marine Biologist as I swooped my side bangs across my forehead. Now I don't even know what the fuck I actually want to do. Am I going to write a novel, a screenplay, monologue jokes for a Late Night Show? Or am I going to quickly find out that there's no future for me here - that I should have been an Econ major and followed in their very practical, very successful footsteps? Hell, I should have stuck with my Elle Woods-induced fantasy that I would be a kickass lawyer in pink.
These are questions that cannot be answered through any other means than time. Failure is inevitable, trust me, my email inbox full of "We have decided to move forward with other candidates for this position," makes that much obvious. But failure is also kind of ...fun? Or maybe it is the fact that at this very moment there is so much I still want to do, and there's not really much concrete evidence that I can't do it. (can you tell I'm not an optimist?)
As employers read my resume, my parents read me to filth about getting serious about their future. Once again, you guys are right, but seriously can you stop referring to me as your unemployed roommate that can't make rent, it's getting old.
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