Mid-Twenties Crisis

I used to think it was impossible to die from boredom. Today I have re-evaluated that belief, and come to the conclusion that yes, you can die from boredom, and that I may only have a few hours left. My job is killing me.

I am a very strange girl. I fit nowhere. I am not corporate, I am not motivated. I don’t like talking on the phone. I am not confident or stable enough to take on managerial roles, or roles that mean I have to deal with people, or lead people. I am creative, but not creative enough. I cannot make a living out of painting or photography, for I am an amateur. I don’t like caring for people. I’m socially retarded. I feel wobbly when I see blood.

My current job is in market research. The responses from open ended questions in questionnaires are transferred to computer, where I use our coding software to look at these responses, group similar responses together, give these common responses a code number, then send the data off to our data analysis department, where they turn all my numerical data into tables so that the client can see and learn what the people have to say about their product. I use email rather than phone, so I don’t have to talk to anyone I don’t want to, and I hide behind a computer screen all day, and am left to just get on with it. It’s perfect for me in many ways, but also boring as hell, and the pay isn’t great. The people I work with are drifters like me. We’re all in our mid-twenties, moderately intelligent, but not career minded. It’s a place people come to when they don’t know what else to do. It’s a stop-gap between school/university, and a proper job/career. I fear I may be stuck here forever.

I do have one alternative. The boyfriend wants me to move in with him, in Oxford. He earns a lot more than I do, and I can just see myself living in his shadow, churning out a couple of kids, doing part time work. It would be so easy to make do with that. So long as I could ignore the nagging feeling that I was missing out on other men, and other possibilities.

I turn 25 tomorrow. That’s the reason for this rant. My life thus far has been uneventful compared to others. I’ve been depressed for most of it, and numbed by medication for longer than my GP thinks healthy. Such a waste. Someone I went to school with is now a policeman. How depressing.