The day (Friday) was going so well. I had been in the city in the morning, walked across Manhattan, gotten my visa... jumped on a train back upstate, and even got to Beacon and found NO parking ticket for my forced night in the city!! Good stuff. I said my hello's to my people in Beacon, went into Mountain Tops and poked around, tried on the Vibram treks, chatted it up, and then headed out. I grabbed a snack on my way towards taking the scenic route through Wiccopee and where the Appalachian trail runs through it on my way home. Sun was out, gorgeous autumn day. Upon getting in, my new phone was there. I spent the next couple hours trying to figure out what the heck all this technology stuff was, and then headed off to spend some time with my grandparents...
Whoops.. Half way there... CRASH!! I got in a car accident. I completely wrecked my car in a three car accident. Everyone else there seemed to by OK (some nice people I might add which don't deserve to have had their day and car's in shambles). I certainly seemed to get the worst of it, both personally and for my car. I just sat there completely dazed... what and end to a day, to a lot really. But I'll be fine, I've had worse collisions on the football field - and one only a couple of weeks ago.
The real travesty in all this though is to my psyche and life scenario. I have struggled for years in always putting my principles and ideals so much above life's practicalities. Always "living in the world as I want it to be" - which I completely believe in and will continue to do. No matter what general practices are, I will do everything I can to be honest and ethical, even at my own expense - which it usually seems to be. This makes life very difficult. People don't pay people to be nice. I carry different priorities than most and as a result I tend to have to struggle. Here I am unemployed, looking for work for over a year, on food stamps, in the application process for Medicaid, and still struggling to put together the funds to go on a three month humanitarian trek in West Africa - a smaller part of my incessant effort to try to make a difference. All the while I am fielding questions about "what I am thinking", "what is wrong with me", "why can't I just balance my ideals with real life?" (i.e. compromise them). I am pretty much standing on my own to try to make a difference. (yes, I do have some great support from a few... you know who you are!!)
Anyway, I have been running completely against the grain for years, I have no money, that car was my only real asset, I am staying with my parents, taking state assistance (and hearing about it from people), and all the while trying to make the world a 'better' place for the future of humanity, and to get myself better qualified to do this. But I just... can't... catch a break. Living in the Hudson Valley you have to have a car. I am already losing friends and contacts because I live a long way away from people and am not in a position to spend money on gas versus money on this project. Yet, if I take a job for a couple weeks or take a job that sacrifices time and compromises principles, then I am not living by my beliefs or example. Now, with no car and no public transportation in the area, I am in a really tough spot. Never mind when I return. I had work set up, but now have no car. It changes things. I had security to return to from this incredibly insecure venture. Now, I almost have to either come back from Sierra Leone with a job here, or find one there. Both my personal and emotional safety nets vanished into the back of that minivan...
But it is tough times that challenge us and make us stronger. I feel at times like I am doing nothing but "training" to make myself stronger, yet I'm never actually getting to use my strength. I just can't find that place within the system that allows me to shine and do the type of work I believe in and am capable of. That day, of course, will come... but it wasn't yesterday... ;)
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