The boys are asleep on either side of me, snoring softly. A half-eaten pita and empty beer bottle rest beside my thermometer, my companions for the weekend. I am exhausted, but the reasons behind it go far deeper than the early morning hour. Yet again, I have received some harsh news, and now I know that I only have one more straw to break before this camel might fall from the very weight of this holy ugly city. I hate to write so negatively, but it feels like the truth, and so, I'll write honestly.
The truth is, I do almost nothing here. I find myself uninspired by the exclusivity of Jewish and Muslim culture, by the fact that I don't understand not one, but two, languages my friends speak, and so I'm often left out of the loop. After so many months, I still can barely read Hebrew and my Arabic may have even gotten worse than when I left. My health seems to be precarious, at best, and I've spent the past week in bed with some variant of the flu. I have been fired from two, going on three, volunteering gigs here, have made about three friends, including my boyfriend, and have done almost nothing except work on disappearing for months. Moreover, I've spent thousands of dollars without working and without much to show for it, except for broken dreams and a sense of feeling even more so in the dark about what I want. All I know is, I want out.
The sad thing is, I felt almost exactly the same way in the states- as though I had no opportunity to really make a living for myself, to make a life for myself, and I felt I HAD to get out. Now, I'm out, and the feeling remains. Which tells me something: this feeling, it's within me. I haven't shined in so long that I think I forget what it feels like. What I know is that I've got to get ahold on my life again. I cannot let chance and fate and luck continue controlling me. Now, the question is how? How does one grab the reins when they've been dragging on the ground so long I don't even know they're still there? And I'm terrified I'm going to fall right off eventually... this ride can't last forever, and I don't want it to.
