24 approaches ...

As my 24th birthday approaches, I'm finding that this funky mood I've been in isn't going away. Since adolescence, I would say 13 or 14, I've always had a kind of depression. I go through periods where I feel like I've dropped off the face of the earth, where I go between feelings of helplessness and just complete apathy. For the most part, the depressive periods don't last long, especially in the last few years where I've only been depressed about once a month (haha).

It seems like this one has only come about in the past week or so, I can't place it exactly. The point is I was fine, I was excited about planning my wedding, and then not even a week ago I suddenly became aware of my birthday being close. This might have been the first year where I wasn't a kid about it. Usually about a month before, I jokingly (well, half jokingly) remind everyone that my birthday is approaching. The other day James and I were watching something on television and I looked at him, and said surprisingly that it was only a couple of weeks until my birthday, and I'm still fine. I went shopping with my mom the other day and I didn't mention it once. Since that moment I acknowledged my birthday, little by little, each time I mention it, and then the past few days where I'm wholly aware of it, this kind of dread is seeping in.

For the first time in my life, I feel a little bit like I'm not sure I want to celebrate it and maybe I'm starting to understand why some people don't care about their birthdays. I'm not sure if my upcoming birthday is the reason for my melancholy. When I was growing up, my parents always made birthdays so special, and I would literally wake up feeling like the greatest person in the world. I remember the warmth and love I felt for myself, used to feel for myself, on that day, and how it radiates from my parents so it feels weird that I should have any apprehension towards it.

There are several factors I believe that are contributing to this funk:
1. My frustration with my horrible job and mostly horrible coworkers. I can always find something good about everyone, but one of my key faults has always been that I am terribly honest about myself and other people. Observance of other people makes faults in other people surface, and since I tend to be unforgiving of my own faults, I have trouble not seeing the faults of others, though I do forgive people rather easily. I always say I am too lazy to hold a grudge. However, I find myself dissapointed with most people. One of my very good friends told me once that I don't like anyone. I don't know if this has more to do with my distrust of most people, or that I'm just picky about the people I choose to spend time with. I think it's the latter. I've always a small group of friends. I'm not into having 100 friends who I barely talk to, when I could have 10 that I'm close to, and have meaningful conversations with. Either way, most of the people I work with are dumb as bricks, gossip hounds, or looking for any chance to stab you in the back. As if the job doesn't suck enough. It's draining to listen to a coworker literally complain about someone else for 20 minutes or talk about how Jeff Dunham is the funniest guy in the world (puke).
2. Part of that job frustration is how I seem to be taking up the slack of a guy who worked only nights who quit recently. I can't tell you how irritating it is to maybe get to see my fiance, that I live with, for maybe an hour in an entire day. When I work until 11 or 12 (only occassionally 12), I also can't go to bed for several hours. It doesn't matter how little sleep I got the night before, it takes me three to five hours to wind down enough to sleep, and lately I can't sleep past 11:30 which sucks when you went to bed at 3 or 4, and sometimes I can't wind down until 5 or 6, in the morning.
3. This job is soul sucking in so many senses of the word. Most of the time, I am mind numbingly bored by doing repetitive tasks and/or "conversations" with my coworkers. Not to mention that I work for what I consider to be the greediest, penny pinching, bigots of all time. There is absolutely no creativity in my job, and when I don't have it in my life, my mood goes south. Not to mention the fact that I still haven't found another job, which I have little to no time to look for, plus I feel like I'm underqualified for everything even with a bachelor's degree.
4. James and I have had little, to no time together whatsoever where it's just us being together. It's all been wedding planning, getting our pictures taken, looking at places or us working completely different schedules because where I work they apparently don't believe in giving people the same work shifts unless you've worked there close to ten years, and us having plans with other people.
5. After my last story in February for the paper, I've recently been given another story for a barber shop in town. This place is only open Thursday - Saturday, and I tend to have the worst hours on those days. So now, I'm just completely overwhelmed with wedding planning, the newspaper, work, and never seeing James. While wedding planning is fun and exciting, it is also very time consuming.
6. I've been reevaluating what it is that makes me happy, and I'm beginning to worry it's not what I went to school for. What makes me happy is the people in my life and while I already knew that, I don't think I am going to be happy with a life consuming career. The things I enjoy doing are not things that make a lot of money, though that doesn't matter to me as long as I am happy. (Photography, writing, graphic design ...)
7. Mostly, I think I'm just feeling stuck. Stuck in this horrible job and I'm scared that this is it. I'm also about to have more oral surgery (oh joy!) and am just thinking about how much further it will put me behind. It also makes me worry about my job because any time I have any kind of oral surgery/am on pain killers, I tend to need about a week's recovery time, and since my attendance is not great to begin with I'm afraid I'll just be fired. I keep putting off even making an appointment because I know even if I don't get fired, we can't afford a week's worth of work not on my paycheck. Not to mention my phobia of all things dentist related. And now, I'm turning 24 (which sounds so old! Way too close to 25!) and where am I in life? Nowhere it feels like. My self esteem over the past week has plummeted in almost every way imaginable. I know I'm getting there, but do I have to be so overwhelmed in the process?

Whenever I get in this mood, I tend to avoid all responsibility in my life. I don't check my e-mail, I don't do the things I know I need to in order to succeed at something I'd much rather be doing than working at my horrible job. I guess I shouldn't be in such a hurry to get everything figured out, and I should know by now that good things only come through hard work and perserverance.  I should listen when I tell myself not to expect over night changes. I just don't know how much longer I can stay at this soul-sucking job.