Mid-life, Schmid-life
What’s the difference between a midlife crisis and a life full of misery?
Let’s talk mental breakdowns for a minute.
I know I said I wasn’t writing for a few weeks but, let’s be honest, sometimes I need this more than you guys do. I love to entertain you, make you laugh, bring you hope and joy, but I also find that sometimes just the process of putting my verbal vomit down is the cathartic action I need to get over whatever the fuck is ailing me that day. Today, it’s my midlife crisis.
In all fairness, can you call it a midlife crisis, though, if you’ve been extraordinarily unhappy for the better part of 15 years and never found an out? It’s a lot my job, a little my love life, and a smidge my total lack of self control that contributes to my own unhappiness. But the main part is most definitely my job, like 97%. Let me be clear: I hate bartending. I hate drunks for that matter. And stupid people. And young people. And old people. And men. Sound too broad? Let me help you better understand by way of the “geriatric pisser”. In July I had a woman, late 50’s/early 60’s, come into work, on our nation’s holiday, and piss all over herself. Not once but twice. All over the chair, the floor, her pants, completely soaked. I could hear her plastic sandals squeaking when she went to the bathroom, but she feigned ignorance. I’m always the bitch: aggressive, overreactive, angry, so, like usual, they gave her another chance. Do you know what happened? She came back in the middle of a busy shift and, yet again, pissed herself. Then got angry that she had a bill. A bill!! Standing there in her light grey sweatpants, old lady urine dripping from the growing puddle at the apex of her ass crack, screaming to not tip these bitches. And that’s a pretty fucking standard day for a bartender in my company.
Which leads me to my company. Bartending is bad enough, my friends, but the addition of working for a company filled with people that can never do better, will never do more, and most who could never attempt to is altogether disheartening at best. Most don’t have any idea what the fuck is going on and the ones that do just don’t give a shit. It is downright criminal to have a voice, an opinion, or even a suggestion that employees be treated with some modicum amount of respect. After seven years of this, I can tell you that if I had the pleasure of driving by a cliff on my way into work everyday, I would’ve happily driven off the side to my imminent doom a long, long time ago. Which brings me squarely up to date on my most recent mental break.
I spent a month in Australia and while it was supposed to give me clarity and vision, and potentially a plan for the future, it has only further muddied the employment waters for me. After swimming with whales, seeing the Indian Ocean, feeling the excitement and wonder of being completely unknown on a continent full of strangers, I find it even harder to mop up piss puddles for $9 an hour. All the reasons I was ever a bartender in the first place, which is absolutely and wholly money, is no longer a thing. Those thousand dollar nights are memories of Christmas past. Big tips, huge payouts, unbelievable jackpots, not anymore. Along with the slow and gradual decline of bartending and all its monetary benefits, the degradation of the profession as a whole, is also the downfall of the culture after Covid. Everyone wants something for free, and they’re willing to argue to the last breath to get it. Hospitality is now just free labor from a bunch of dumb mother fuckers who are stuck in the job, stuck in the life, without a place to go or a relevant profession to fall back on. No one wants to hire a former general manager with a graduate degree to twirl signs on the street corner and shut the fuck up about it.
So where do you go? What do you do? What is the play for a middle aged person in an entry level job?
I can’t kill myself; my dog would never forgive me. So I’ve made the incredibly difficult decision to sell my home, the only place I’ve ever lived, the place I have loved since I was 23 years old, my only shelter from the hard and unforgiving world, and run the fuck away. My mother thinks it’s a terrible idea. I admit, it might just be. I have heart palpitations every time I think about what it means. But on the other side of that is the undeniable truth that with cold hard cash also comes absolute financial stability and freedom. Pissy Patty no more. Instead of mopping up urine and wiping up vomit, I’ll have the gift of time. Time away from my misery. Time to work on myself. Time to work out what I want, where I want to go, and what I want to do. Instead of constantly focusing on how completely fucking miserable I am, and stuck in that misery, I’ll have the option to focus on my blog, my website, my photography, and all the little deals I’ve worked so hard to procure but have not had a shred of time to nurture. And in order to gain this freedom, this serenity, this peace, I will have to sacrifice the only thing I have in the whole world: my home.
Is it a midlife crisis or do we wake up one day and realize we can’t endure one more moment of unhappiness in this short and bitter life? I’d love to hear your opinions, thoughts, ad commentary on the subject. Is misery just a part of life, of adulthood? Is this the standard adult experience? Would you leave everything you know to start over with the unknown? Drop a comment below!!