#disallusionment

[tokka]

#ColdWeather gear for needh..#Thanksgiving night. Tryin to fight my ##disallusionment with the state of affairs. We'll see how it goes.

[sarahbtn]

Diary of a Recovering Liberal

Introduction

Have you ever noticed when driving through the United States, particularly in major cities, that all the projects look the same?  Honestly, you could drive blindly into any city in this country and find them without guidance or instruction.  I know that now. 

When I came here, I don’t think I had ever actually seen a project.  No, I know I hadn’t because I had to ask the interviewer what a Housing Authority actually does.  Of course I had heard stories.  Growing up in Chicago, Cabrini Green was almost mythic.  And that’s exactly what my parents thought when I called them back in Illinois to tell them I’d been hired at this small town southern housing authority.  They thought I was putting myself in grave danger.  Their young, attractive and intelligent girl was throwing her life away to work with thugs and gang-bangers.  I had a master’s degree in art history for heaven’s sake.  I had worked as a college professor before I left Illinois. 

Not to say that I was privileged as such.  We certainly weren’t wealthy.  I had the opportunity to go to quality private schools because my parents both worked and scrimped and saved.  I grew up a sheltered suburban lifestyle, but it was replete with garage sale clothes and hand-me-downs.  We donated or sold our toys before we could buy new ones.  We had a huge garden in the back yard from which the majority of our diet (and our punishments) came (Mom sent us with a wash tub to the bean patch whenever we were in trouble.  “Pick until it’s full!”  My brother won’t eat green beans to this day).  So while I was protected from some of the harsh realities of life, I was very accustomed to hard work, financial economy, and efficient use of available resources.  I had built for myself a decent life in Illinois, teaching college and living in an apartment.  But I was cold, lonely even among friends, and sinking into depression.

The South is very different.  And I wanted it to be.  Though I loved art (and still do), I hated teaching.  I wanted to strike out on my own and stop trying to live up to the expectations that others held for me.  So I moved to a place where nobody knew me.  No  expectations.  These kind folks didn’t know that I had carried a 4.0 grade point average all the way through graduate school.  They didn’t know that I spoke three languages and dabbled in two others.  To them I was just “cake on a plate” – a young woman ripe for marriage who wouldn’t last long amongst the southern gentlemen.  Here I was able to strip away all the pretention and learn who I really was and who I really wanted to become.  Obviously, the housing authority director had an idea about these glimmers of my past.  He read my resume, after all.  In fact, he spent the entire interview trying to talk me OUT of taking the job at the housing authority.  He thought I was over-qualified, over-educated, and would become bored, putting him right back where he started searching for an admin assistant. 

At the time, this position seemed ideal for me.  The housing office was only minutes from my home, unlike the antique shop I had been managing that required me to drive all the way to southwest Nashville  each morning, more than an hour long commute, for $11 an hour.  Though there was a community college in town and it did offer basic history of art classes, it would only require my services on an adjunct basis and would not pay me enough to live, nor would they provide any health insurance or benefits.  The Housing Authority, on the other hand, was a government job with excellent benefits that was close to home (no commute!) and would have the added benefit of giving me the opportunity to help those less fortunate than me. 

As a fresh graduate of art school, I was naïve and idealistic.  I had visions of artist’s communes and farmer’s co-operatives in my mind.  I genuinely believed that no one would choose to live in a project because every person is born with some level of pride and ambition.  I was convinced these people were here because of unfortunate circumstances in their lives – addiction, abuse, abandonment at critical stages of development, etc. – and that given the opportunity, they would pull themselves up by their boot straps and make a better life for themselves and their children.  I just knew that I could use my teaching experience to teach basic life skills – money management, frugal home economics and the like.  I could make a big difference in helping these folks get a leg up in a world that hadn’t dealt them a fair shake.  I might even be able to give art lessons to some kids with talent and interest.  Show them how to channel their talents into works of beauty instead of vandalism.  I wanted to start a community garden to help improve the diets of these food-stamp-reliant families.  I thought the office had more than enough storage buildings that we could use one as a community closet where neighbors could share gently used hand-me-downs with other families.  Oh, I had high hopes all right.  

[jonathansvision-blog]

Disillusionment.

Honestly there are times that I do wish I was in a relationship, but when I see certain situations it makes me realize maybe i'm better without one.  For instance, I really get irritated when people claim they are in love after one week and that they can't live without the other person.  I know how it feels to be hurt, how to deal with the loss of something great, but at the same time, I don't feel that I am reliant on one thing or person in my life and honestly maybe i dont want to be in a situation where a possible mistake leads to regret, because I deal with regret now, and it sucks, you were my biggest one so maybe the relationship that most people think is a great thing, including myself, might be instead a bad idea unless that person is a long termer.  I really dont know... some days, I just like to think.