I've not written much this year, as I've been tired and feeling generally untethered. I spend my day sitting at home, in front of a computer - so to continue to do that in my off time, I hold no desire for. I sit and think and compose thoughts to myself, but do not want to sit in front of a computer, again, so everything just drifts off.
The last few months have been about accepting a new position at work (a one-year contract) which will increase my salary by about 100$ a month. Not nothing when all you have is debt.
In a few days, I will have a room-renter. In her early twenties, she will rent the room for a few hundred dollars a month, which will help me throw money at the ever-present aforementioned debt.
Lately I've been thinking a lot about how the things you own end up owning you. How these social contracts of ownership and adulthood, only ever just reinforce dependence on a system that uses you so fully. I think of the alternative, working hard on the land and isolating yourself - but being fundamentally lazy, that only seems like an answer for the highly skilled and motivated. I am neither of those things.
I've been watching a lot of horror films over the holiday. Zombie films are always fascinating to me, because of the way in which people are represented as ultimately selfish and child-like. Yes, but also, there is so much reassurance in the group, which really is dependent on the reproduction of invisible rules. How these invisible rules are not necessary, but are, in a world that reproduces them daily.
I think of a mortgage. I think of borrowing large sums of money from a bank in order to slowly and painfully, reimburse them. I do not own my home. The bank does. I take out a loan, in order to pay for repairs and improvements. I have hundreds of thousands of dollars in mortgages and loans - and who am I? My job isn't great. It's an entry-level clerk job. I have no wealth. I've only been able to access these funds due to the government's name on my cheques and the amount of capital my mother was able to bring to the transaction.
I think about if a bomb hit tomorrow. With the world in disarray - would all of the automatic payments keep taxing my accounts? What are the financial rules when we are so close to it all falling apart?
This past year has been difficult. It's been confusing and anxiety-provoking. This isn't unique to me. I think we're all looking around and seeing how fragile all of it is. How neighbors can be helpful, but they can also be fucking anti-masker idiots who would risk us all to not be inconvenienced or directly interpellated in any way.
This year has further isolated me. It's been difficult, but on some days, not so much. I have, after all, lived this way for over a decade.
I look at some friends differently. Some are incapable of being alone. Of making small sacrifices. Not many people are able to stay home, alone, for the greater good. That speaks to a great weakness. We all have our frailties, being alone is not mine.
Looking forward to 2021, I do not expect much to change. I will be working from home until at least the summer, I will be working this new contract, and learning new things, and being challenged. I can, however, return to my clerk job if this new job does not work out. A subtle safety net that makes all the difference for me.
The winter and the dark make quarantine harder, so as we push through 2021, the weather will improve and the sun will come out.
I don't know that things will ever go back to how they were before 2020. Too much has happened. Political systems have been shown to be lacking in a way that even the obtuse can't ignore. The fragility of it all, is so obvious now. Our dependence on commercial systems. How quickly panic can spread. How little it takes for things to get scary.
I don't expect 2021 to be any easier. Just different.
For now, all I am is exhausted.
