Is Long-term Happiness Elusive?

So I keep hearing how lucky I am to NOT be working.  And of course I find it necessary to correct everyone.  I do work.  I just don’t get paid. Well, not directly.  Let’s just say that I don’t get a Form W-2 at the end of the tax year.  But you better believe that I work.

Like anything in life, there are strengths and weaknesses.  And as such, my job has things that I enjoy and some that I don’t.  Every single day when the kids have left for school, I asses the areas they have utilized, and there is always something to clean.  It doesn’t matter if I have left the kitchen spotless before I go to bed, without a doubt, there will be a mess waiting for me.  I have resigned myself to realizing that constant cleaning comes with the territory, but what has happened to the mindset that if a room is clean, it should remain that way for at least a day or two?  It worked for me when I was a kid.

Another thing about this job that is a negative is getting my charges to listen to me more.  When I was a child, there was no way that my parents would be repeating the same things to us daily.  I can be pretty strict, but I haven’t yet figured out how to instill that fear in them that my parents had.  And I know you are thinking that that is a good thing, but I disagree.  If fear is what it takes to get stuff done around this place, then it’s all good.

Other than that, I really can’t complain about my current job.  And truth be told, if pushed, I’ll have to admit that these are really frivolous.  This is why:  When my children leave an irresponsible mess, and I don’t feel like cleaning it, I don’t.  They’ll be back, so that mess will just be there waiting for them to clean.  Furthermore, if I had kids who listened to me all the time, even I would think that something was wrong with them.

Hence, it appears like I’m at that fork in the road where if I’m working, I wish I were at home, and when I’m at home, I wish I had a job.  You all know that feeling.  I mean, think about it.  I am not on anyone else’s schedule.  I go at my own pace.  I have no one to answer to.  I can take a nap in the middle of the day or watch TV should I chose.  I should be thrilled, right?

The other day, when I was griping about feeling unfulfilled and unproductive because I don’t have a job, a dear friend said to me that she always wanted to have three children, stay home and take care of them and her husband.  She said, “Myra, you have my dream job.”  And right away I had one of Oprah’s aha moments.

I feel unfulfilled and unproductive at times because this was NEVER my dream job.  Back in the day, my dream job was to be a high powered financial executive.  When I think of my Finance and Investment degree collecting cobweb, when I think of my peers (well some of them) working in the jobs of their dreams, I don’t feel like a total loser, but it can be depressing.  And there are the times when I take that brush to clean a toilet, I say to myself, “Is this what my life is going to be like forever?  Always cleaning poop!”  And I realize how far I am from my dream job.

But it is typically short-lived because I usually get a call from a friend or family member who tells me about her day at work, and immediately I am ecstatic that I don’t have to put up with a shitty boss, have to wake up early and get dressed up to go somewhere that I don’t want to be and talk to people that I don’t want to see.

In a perfect world, I’d be doing two things – writing literature that brings people to tears from laughter and fixing their finances.  And in this perfect world, I would actually receive a W-2 because I would be getting paid.  However, life is not perfect, but because of my present job, I’m able to write a blog that make people laugh (most of the times), and I handle this family’s finances like it is a Fortune 500 company.  Not sure if all the spreadsheets are necessary, but they sure are fun to prepare.

Anyone who knows me and my bag of pet peeves well, knows that this saying is included in my top ten; but perspectively speaking, after I have weighed the pros and cons, the only thing that I can say is, “I am blessed and highly favored.”