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Not a day goes by that I don't wish I were a more efficient kind of person. I'm also keenly aware of the irony of knowing that our society is far too fixated on productivity as a sign of moral worth and that we'd probably all be a lot better off if we stepped off the hamster wheel of "line must always go up!"
I find the metaphor of the hamster wheel an apt one, perhaps moreso than whoever it was that originated it. When I was a pre-teen (or a tween, I think they're calling kids of that age now?), I started keeping hamsters as pets until I was 18 years old, when my last hamster, a rescue Norwegian Hamster named Nelson, died of old age. Being me, I dove into keeping hamsters with extreme enthusiasm and did a whole bunch of reading about them, their dietary requirements, their environment, how to provide enrichment, and any number of other things. Don't be fooled by all that nice-sounding text: I was a terrible owner for the first few years, and learned some hard lessons, probably at the hamsters' expense, even though I did my best. To misquote from Supernatural, I really should have done the best of somebody better.
All that being said, one of the first things I learned is that hamsters can become addicted to their running wheels. Just like humans, they get an endorphin rush from running, the same way humans get a "runner's high." Deprived of any other stimulation or enrichment, they will chase that high until it kills them, because running is not a super well-balanced form of exercise for them. Hamsters aren't exactly designed to run marathons, after all.
So it turns out that if you lock up a creature in an environment that's not sufficiently close to its natural state, the creature will turn to whatever coping mechanisms are at hand in order to get a break from its constant feeling of alienation, even if hamsters maybe aren't as prone to considering whether or not they're having an existential crisis. There was a study about drug addiction in rats that came to the same conclusion. A rat in a sterile environment will use drugs (I can't recall if it was heroin or something else), but a rat put in an environment that's essentially rat paradise will eschew the drugs in favour of all the heavenly, ratty things to engage with.
Anyway, I am kind of the hamster in the metaphor, but the hamster that has run until it's gone lame in one leg and now can't run on the wheel and is pining for the wheel because it doesn't know how to do anything else. Yes, my metaphor is convoluted, I can't help it, I'm too far in to turn back.
But yeah, I haven't been getting much done for years now, and I can never quite figure out how to fix that. It might not even need fixing, but I have a strong feeling that it should be fixed. Okay, technically that's a thought and not a feeling. But whenever I think about the fact that I don't get much done, I get strong feelings of guilt and shame and disappointment and frustration and even a little bit of sadness, not to say actual despair. So I'm going to roll all of those up together and say "I feel as though I should be getting more done." For one thing, time is rolling inexorably forward, fugit irreparabile tempus and all that, and I would kind of like to have something more to show for my life than having simply existed and used up resources. Hardly a meaningful contribution, when you think about it.
I'm not in a bad position, per se, especially compared to the vast majority of people out there. I have a job (albeit a temporary one), and a roof over my head, and pets that I love dearly. I'm not just surviving, but I don't feel as though I'm exactly thriving, either. My problem is that just the thought of trying to do something beyond going to work, paying the bills, and keeping my household fed seems exhausting to me. I keep making plans to do things that would help, and even when the plans are as simple and easy as I can conceive of, they often don't come to fruition. Even a small plan like "get up one hour earlier on the weekends and start one tray of seeds" is more than I've been able to manage so far.
Today my big accomplishment, after the four and a half hours I devoted to Quaker Meeting (I explained all that in my previous post), was getting my laundry done. I had put it off for several weeks, mostly because KK does her laundry on the weekends and that leaves nearly no time for me to get mine done. She has a lot more clothes than I do, and seems to do anywhere from three to six loads every weekend. Honestly I am kind of mystified as to how she generates that much laundry, except that I think she wears different pajamas to bed every night and I change mine out once a week. Perhaps that makes me a disgusting person, I don't know, but that's how I was raised--a new nightie or new pajamas got picked out on Sunday nights, and would go in the laundry on Saturday. I used to do two loads of laundry a week when I lived alone, one load of clothes and one load of linens. No, I don't separate out my clothes, because I am a barbarian and also I specifically buy clothes that will put up with not being separated. If it's white, can't be machine washed or machine dried, or requires ironing, it's not allowed to live in my closet. The only exception is a nice dress or two that I wear to parties, and since I haven't been to a party since my 40th birthday, I don't even bother with that anymore. Anyway, this weekend I've actually had to do three loads of just clothes, because I haven't been able to use the washing machine in weeks, and even now KK still has more laundry to do.
But yes. Laundry is my major accomplishment of the day. Yay. /Monty Python
Before overtime ate half my day yesterday and my 100% needed nap from 14:30 to 17:00, I had thought that I might be able to at least try to tidy part of the house, or maybe start a tray of seedlings, or something. If not yesterday, then at least today, and absolutely none of that has happened. I did manage to get up at 09:00 today, but all I managed was breakfast and coffee before Quaker Meeting, and I got a bit more knitting done on the Hubris Shawl, but that was about it.
So the house is still a disaster, my seedlings still aren't started, and I still have to work up the energy to cook dinner. We're having Parmesan-crusted tilapia and garlic sautéed bok choi, for anyone who's curious.
Intellectually, I understand that I should just accept that I've reached the limits of my capacity, but it feels like I'm doing so very little. All of my energy seems to have to go into doing the work that gets me a paycheck, and that leaves little or nothing left over for the work that brings me fulfilment. In the past I found that if I forced myself to do more things, I could just go on adrenaline or endorphins or whatever, but these days my body just won't cooperate, and it's so, so frustrating.
Yes, rest is important, but there has to be more to life than just working and sleeping, surely?
I find the metaphor of the hamster wheel an apt one, perhaps moreso than whoever it was that originated it. When I was a pre-teen (or a tween, I think they're calling kids of that age now?), I started keeping hamsters as pets until I was 18 years old, when my last hamster, a rescue Norwegian Hamster named Nelson, died of old age. Being me, I dove into keeping hamsters with extreme enthusiasm and did a whole bunch of reading about them, their dietary requirements, their environment, how to provide enrichment, and any number of other things. Don't be fooled by all that nice-sounding text: I was a terrible owner for the first few years, and learned some hard lessons, probably at the hamsters' expense, even though I did my best. To misquote from Supernatural, I really should have done the best of somebody better.
All that being said, one of the first things I learned is that hamsters can become addicted to their running wheels. Just like humans, they get an endorphin rush from running, the same way humans get a "runner's high." Deprived of any other stimulation or enrichment, they will chase that high until it kills them, because running is not a super well-balanced form of exercise for them. Hamsters aren't exactly designed to run marathons, after all.
So it turns out that if you lock up a creature in an environment that's not sufficiently close to its natural state, the creature will turn to whatever coping mechanisms are at hand in order to get a break from its constant feeling of alienation, even if hamsters maybe aren't as prone to considering whether or not they're having an existential crisis. There was a study about drug addiction in rats that came to the same conclusion. A rat in a sterile environment will use drugs (I can't recall if it was heroin or something else), but a rat put in an environment that's essentially rat paradise will eschew the drugs in favour of all the heavenly, ratty things to engage with.
Anyway, I am kind of the hamster in the metaphor, but the hamster that has run until it's gone lame in one leg and now can't run on the wheel and is pining for the wheel because it doesn't know how to do anything else. Yes, my metaphor is convoluted, I can't help it, I'm too far in to turn back.
But yeah, I haven't been getting much done for years now, and I can never quite figure out how to fix that. It might not even need fixing, but I have a strong feeling that it should be fixed. Okay, technically that's a thought and not a feeling. But whenever I think about the fact that I don't get much done, I get strong feelings of guilt and shame and disappointment and frustration and even a little bit of sadness, not to say actual despair. So I'm going to roll all of those up together and say "I feel as though I should be getting more done." For one thing, time is rolling inexorably forward, fugit irreparabile tempus and all that, and I would kind of like to have something more to show for my life than having simply existed and used up resources. Hardly a meaningful contribution, when you think about it.
I'm not in a bad position, per se, especially compared to the vast majority of people out there. I have a job (albeit a temporary one), and a roof over my head, and pets that I love dearly. I'm not just surviving, but I don't feel as though I'm exactly thriving, either. My problem is that just the thought of trying to do something beyond going to work, paying the bills, and keeping my household fed seems exhausting to me. I keep making plans to do things that would help, and even when the plans are as simple and easy as I can conceive of, they often don't come to fruition. Even a small plan like "get up one hour earlier on the weekends and start one tray of seeds" is more than I've been able to manage so far.
Today my big accomplishment, after the four and a half hours I devoted to Quaker Meeting (I explained all that in my previous post), was getting my laundry done. I had put it off for several weeks, mostly because KK does her laundry on the weekends and that leaves nearly no time for me to get mine done. She has a lot more clothes than I do, and seems to do anywhere from three to six loads every weekend. Honestly I am kind of mystified as to how she generates that much laundry, except that I think she wears different pajamas to bed every night and I change mine out once a week. Perhaps that makes me a disgusting person, I don't know, but that's how I was raised--a new nightie or new pajamas got picked out on Sunday nights, and would go in the laundry on Saturday. I used to do two loads of laundry a week when I lived alone, one load of clothes and one load of linens. No, I don't separate out my clothes, because I am a barbarian and also I specifically buy clothes that will put up with not being separated. If it's white, can't be machine washed or machine dried, or requires ironing, it's not allowed to live in my closet. The only exception is a nice dress or two that I wear to parties, and since I haven't been to a party since my 40th birthday, I don't even bother with that anymore. Anyway, this weekend I've actually had to do three loads of just clothes, because I haven't been able to use the washing machine in weeks, and even now KK still has more laundry to do.
But yes. Laundry is my major accomplishment of the day. Yay. /Monty Python
Before overtime ate half my day yesterday and my 100% needed nap from 14:30 to 17:00, I had thought that I might be able to at least try to tidy part of the house, or maybe start a tray of seedlings, or something. If not yesterday, then at least today, and absolutely none of that has happened. I did manage to get up at 09:00 today, but all I managed was breakfast and coffee before Quaker Meeting, and I got a bit more knitting done on the Hubris Shawl, but that was about it.
So the house is still a disaster, my seedlings still aren't started, and I still have to work up the energy to cook dinner. We're having Parmesan-crusted tilapia and garlic sautéed bok choi, for anyone who's curious.
Intellectually, I understand that I should just accept that I've reached the limits of my capacity, but it feels like I'm doing so very little. All of my energy seems to have to go into doing the work that gets me a paycheck, and that leaves little or nothing left over for the work that brings me fulfilment. In the past I found that if I forced myself to do more things, I could just go on adrenaline or endorphins or whatever, but these days my body just won't cooperate, and it's so, so frustrating.
Yes, rest is important, but there has to be more to life than just working and sleeping, surely?
