Long Time Gone

It's been a long time. I think I'm going through a quarter life crisis. I know it sounds funny, and I didn't actually believe the term until I heard John Mayer's "Why Georgia" lyrics. "Must be a quarter life crisis." No, but really! I started looking into it, and it turns out that there is actually a such thing. How does this apply to me, you ask? Well, for those of you who know me, I'm a nurse assistant. I love to scrapbook, and hobby in photography, and I love, love, LOVE poetry, but I don't think I do well enough to call myself a poet. A writer, maybe, but poets are far more amazing at writing than I am.

Anyway, I'm not sure when I realized that I didn't want to be a nurse anymore, but it has something to do with my current job at an unspecified rehab center. The thing is, I just don't FEEL it anymore. I still love taking care of patients, but sometimes the place is so damn understaffed that I'm running around like a chicken with my head cut off. That's definitely not HAPPY me. So, I've been doing some soul-searching. I attended a "Discover the Possibilities" class at Moraine Valley Community College, which let me take a career quiz. There are two parts. The first part is a quiz, with results. So far it hasn't been very helpful, because there are far too many career options. I still have yet to take the second part, which will help me look into several career options.

For the time being, I'm considering the following:
*something in the writing business (editor? Journalist? Writer?)
*something in health care (xray tech? medical assistant? EMT?)

No matter which way I turn, one career keeps trying to rear it's head: photography. I used to love taking photos for poets at Neo Soul. It was just for something to do. But one of them asked me how much I could do a shoot for? Since it's a hobby, I don't have a price. Then Joe Brundidge, another poet friend keeps telling me that I'd make an amazing photographer. While photography doesn't pay the bills, I wonder if I should do it as a side job and learn as much as humanly possible about it, and then possibly go into photography as a full time career, AFTER I know tons about it. I even looked it up on youtube, and stumbled upon this photographer named Lara Blair. She takes photos of dogs. She did two videos on youtube, and in one of them she says to read your camera manual from cover to cover. So that's just what I'll do. And practice, practice, practice. As for the career thing, I'm still undecided, but I've filed my FAFSA, and I have until Fall 2011 to figure out just what the hell it is that I'm doing.

Here's to lots of soul searching research...