Morning all.. its saturday!! yeeesssss!! i can lie in bed a couple extra hours, listen to music, surf the web and drink tea.. anyone who lives a ‘normal’ life will know that this is definitely something to celebrate!!

well its been over 4 months since i kicked off this blog, and i thought it was high time we revisited the hot topic this blog was initially set out to report on.. normality.. life in suburbia!!

so.. i have to say that suburban life has treated me quite well over the past few months.. my job is pleasant at the best of times, the people i work with are very nice and sociable, my daily route to work is an 18 minute walk down some quiet, pretty streets, i live with nice people, including shirlz who is someone i trust and share similar life goals with, im playing sport twice a week and getting fitter and im able to save money like never before which means im able to enjoy a few holidays and pay off those travel debts from last year at the same time!

so you might say.. congrats shmeim.. youve done it.. youve successfully joined and integrated with the rest of the suburban world.. youre doing all the normal things people do and your life appears to have balance.. good stuff.. u must be really satisfied and ready to step it up to the next level.. u know how it goes shmeim.. work a little harder and impress them at work.. get the promotion.. meet a nice small town girl at the local fair on a sunny weekend.. start shopping for a house.. plan weekend braais with the jones’s……………..

sounds like im on track.. except there are just a few problems.. well more than a few problems to be honest. for starters try and explain to me that feeling i get when i first sit down at my desk in the morning at work, and i open my inbox and masses of emails start arriving.. emails about stuff that people pretend are really important.. and require instant action from me.. but in all reality make no difference to my philosophy of life whatsoever. am i really expected to stress and push other people to prioritse what i need done, just so a batch of mobile phones get delivered today and not tomorrow? not to mention, later that week there will be a team meeting to discuss how effectively we are meeting our delivery targets.. 2 hours worth of acronym english thrown around the table, which is even harder to follow than text (sms) lingo .. sitting there nodding appropriately at the right times, expressing my opinion occasionally just to convince my manager that delivery targets really are the reason i was brought into this world .. god its fantastic isnt it!

then at the end of my working day, my body demands that i run around a squash court for an hour to compensate for the fact that all ive really done during the day is sit on my ass and eat a big lunch (if only thinking burnt calories!!).. and finally its home time.. (if youre a single guy) a quick microwave meal dinner (married guys normally get dinner cooked for them but trust me this deal comes with a whole new set of extra obstacles which im certain are impossible to juggle when you have so little time to dedicate) .. a bit of tele to recover.. and finally to top it all off.. the best part of the day.. bills! the ultimate reminder that all your dedication to unworthy purposes was really just to prolong the suffering so you can do it all again tomorrow, and god willing make it to the weekend!!

im sorry that i paint such a dire snapshot of life.. maybe u see it all very differently.. everybody has different priorities and takes pleasure from different aspects of life.. but in my eyes.. the path i am on now will ultimately lead to this. a life so average and void of creativity that i honestly would rather be dead. hehehe thats sounds really awful doesnt it.. sorry.. a bit of strong english is always a good shock factor and adds to the overall emotion of the passage.. but its not to say i want to kill myself.. not at all.. its just a timely reminder that i need to follow my instincts and think hard before i commit to anything that doesnt feel right.

so im still not sure what to make of normality.. there are aspects of it that i now like.. i like having a familiar home and familiar people in my life.. but i also like to have the opportunity to see new places from time to time, and i think its important that new people are always coming into ones life, otherwise the view never changes. i dont think i will ever be the stable office job type.. i need to create.. and this is ultimately the path i will follow and need to start putting my efforts into. creative, non routine based career paths are not as easy to manufacture, and for sure this path will put the picket fence home lifestyle in jeopardy, but there isnt really a choice. if i strike it lucky, i will be one of a privileged few who will be recognised and handsomely rewarded, and if not, then i will always be a struggling artist, but content in myself. i will wake up each day with less, but with passion burning in my soul. and when people meet me in the street, they will feel my energy, and i will feel there’s.

surely nothing can be more important than that?

xx