He Turned to Me As If to Say, "Hurry, Boy, It's Waiting There for You."

I've been doing two things a lot lately: (1) listening to podcasts and (2) contemplating where my life is going. I have plenty of time for the former because the answer to the latter is "nowhere, for the moment."

I am uncomfortable with stasis. I like progress, change (if it's positive), forward movement. I may not always know what my goals are, but I am nevertheless compelled to move toward something. Many things frustrate me about my current situation of underemployment, but the lack of movement is right up near the top. I feel like the Road Runner when his legs start spinning to get away from Wile E. Coyote, except I can't seem to get to the point where I shoot off down the road. I've papered the universe with my resume, and I haven't gotten a single offer of permanent employment. I've considered a couple of promising-sounding alternative fields of employment, but I can't seem to get any traction there either. At some level, I know that this situation will end either with my moving forward or, less ideally, dying. But it's hard to feel stuck. It makes me feel like my life is being wasted, despite my best efforts.

My podcasts have helped me with this in some small way. I was listening to an Amateur Traveler podcast on Cape Town, South Africa, and I heard that Nelson Mandela spent 18 years imprisoned in the Robben Island penitentiary (of 27 total years in prison). After his release, we all know he went on to lead South Africa and generally be completely amazing all day, every day.

Now, I don't have quite enough hubris to compare myself to Nelson Mandela nor my struggles to find a job to his struggles to be seen as a man equal to any white man in his country. But this historic fact reminded me that a period in which my life is stalled does not mean I will never accomplish anything.