breaking news:

Due to time constraints, there's no way in hell I'm going to be able to successfully apply for JET this year. I was jolted out of near-sleep last night in appilcation-related panic, and after reviewing what I still needed to do (lots), I realized that I still needed to get an Enrollment Verification Form QR-96 from the registrar's office. By tomorrow. Now, normally, this wouldn't be a problem; everyone in that office is really nice and understanding, and they've all seen my puppy-dog eyes enough that I have every confidence that they wouldn't mind speeding up the timetable on form requisition for me. Only problem is that this week is spring pre-registration, so there's constantly a line of like twenty people in what is a very small space. It seems kinda like kicking someone when they're down to expect them to even produce any paperwork this week, let alone give them only a day's notice, so I found myself last night deciding that there was no way I could in good conscience attempt to throw an application together and get it overnight-mailed by Friday morning. I still have a number of other options for next year, including an increasing peace made with getting a job next year that will have no bearing on a career, just living a little bit. And, anyway, I'm still waiting on what happens with that Fulbright. Oh, and pushing out an application would also require asking faculty for recommendations on a day's notice and making up a personal statement ("Why do you want to go to Japan?" for which my best answer was "Cause it's not here?)... and I have the flu. It's just... not... happening. So I was able to go back to sleep last night (after doing a couple pages of somnolent academic article-reading), accepting the decision.

Well, wouldn't you know it, this morning, I felt pretty good. Not sickness/health-wise or anything, that's about the same. And I still have just as much that I'm grotesquely behind deadlines in. But I got a couple things done, I got some writing back that was encouraging, and I had a sort of shot-in-the-arm meeting with a Prof. I started getting upbeat about the dwindling amount of school in my life, about the LSAT I'm underprepared to take (sick) on Saturday, about the future, even. And on the crest of this wave of good feeling, I started thinking about the JET application. What I could maybe write that personal statement about. Who I should ask for a rec, even. Dammit, is all I have to say to that. Basically, I go from being overstretched and panic-attacky last night to dropping an obligation. Then I feel momentarily relieved, so what do I do? I try to ADD MORE SHIT TO DO. That's wrong in oh so many ways. I don't want to call it "ambition," because I don't feel like it has a lot of direction, but I feel like I can't be content with having a set of things to do and then doing them. I'm still a month behind where I said I'd be on one of my grading work-study jobs (the course has "recommended" homework deadlines for students, so it's a sort of two-way street). I'm still vaguely depressed by emotional co-dependence. I called in sick to work twice this week, because my body feels just awful, and I definitely had to take a bunch of excedrin yesterday so I could keep working... it's not fucking fair that my subconscious isn't content with getting through what I can, always pushing. Sure, it was fun as a kid, always wanting to learn more about how stuff worked, how a task is performed, what it means to ____, but this is ridiculous. As an adult (sorta), I feel like childlike drive to learn has left me with little more than a short attention span and a deep affection for Win Ben Stein's Money.