Hold out your hand so I can implant your career chip

I'm having a midlife crisis.  Again.  This is at least my fourth.  My first one was in first grade when I realized, as I was sitting at my desk bored out of my skull, that I was going to have to sit at a desk every damned day for the next 12+ years.  Then I think I had another one in 1988.  But honestly, the 80s should have caused everyone to freak out a little... have you seen that decade?  Whew.

This latest one though, it's a doozy.  At least with the previous ones, there was an end in sight.  Change was coming.  The 80s, by definition, couldn't last longer than 10 years.  (No, my crisis was not brought about by spandex ankle-lace leggings, blue eye shadow and AquaNet hair)  This time, I'm trapped.  No light at the end of the tunnel.  Just a long straight path of monotony.  Someone else's road that I have to follow.

You may be wondering where I'm going with this.  Honestly, I'm not sure.  There's a huge long story, mostly it revolves around there not being anything for me here in this strange combination of city-snob-plus-hillbilly-hell where I'm being forced to live.  So I've been trying to figure out what exactly I'd like to do, or how I could fix my situation.

I have long ago answered the question of what career path I prefer to follow.  I'm a science dork.  All the way to the core.

There ya go.  The real me.  Now here's the real problem: if I had a choice, I would NOT work in the corporate world.  They're all a bunch of regulation-following snobs.  Not only that, I only have a bachelor's degree and I've looked into the corporation Designated Hitter works for... you guessed it, I'm not qualified.  Every task that I would be qualified to do, they have automated.

The robots are taking over!

 

Okay, with that path being cut off, let's analyze a new way to go.  I love working in academia.  So I checked out a nearby college.  Their big science research area is medical, and I'm pretty sure I wouldn't fit in with them either.  And I don't have the right background.  Once again - not qualified.  I don't have a microbiology or genetics background.  The only stuff I'm qualified for there is "Requirements - High School Diploma or equivalent"  So... yay?

Honestly though I've never minded being on the edge of being qualified.  I've always said that I don't want to be the one creating the experiments and proposing the theories, I'm just crap-happy hiding in a back corner of a lab with a pipetman in my hand.  And I have been.  I've had jobs fitting that description twice and have loved them.  Dearly.  And would do them again in a heartbeat.

However, here in this hellhole, there is a severe lack of those jobs like I've done before.  (I think I'm talking in circles now, sorry about that)  And even if I did get all sorts of qualified and land a job with the medical geniuses, there would still be an issue of having to deal with a horrendous commute.

Moral of story: I have no idea what to do.  I'm stuck in this cow-town because of Hitter, and there's nothing for me to do here.

But, I recently did some more deep-soul-searching.  I got to thinking about my feelings of not wanting to be the one developing experiments.  Why do I feel that way?  I naturally find myself analyzing other people's theories, developing other ways of looking at things, and so on.  I mean seriously, I watch Mythbusters and scream at the TV because of all the holes in their theories and yell at them about how they should be doing it.  Hitter laughs at me.

And then it came to me.  Rebellion.  (no, it's not about sex this time)  I remember something that happened when I was still in college, I think I was maybe on my second internship but hadn't yet graduated and definitely didn't have anything lined up for after school.  I was back in the hick town I grew up in, talking to a guy that was an old acquaintance of the parental unit.  Turns out Designated Drinker had been telling everyone in hick town that I not only had a full-time job lined up for when I graduated in another year and half, but that I was going to be the next brilliant inventor for the giant corporation I was interning with.  And I replied with "oh hell no!"

But... what if...

What if I really could do it, and what if I would really enjoy it?  What if I really am brilliant?  Ha ha ha ha ha you know what I mean.  Seriously though, what if I should be a lead scientific researcher and I'm not doing it because I want to tell my father to go to hell?  What if I should be finding the cure for cancer, AIDS, lactose intolerance, paper cuts, and salmonella poisoning?  (quite a combo, huh?  for reference, see the previous food fight) What if I should be winning a Nobel prize?

Not shown: science groupies.  Also the Easter Bunny and other fictional creatures.

What if I should go back to college, get a PhD in biomedical engineering or something.  Okay, enough fantasizing.  But a Masters in chemistry doesn't sound so bad.  Except I'd still run into the problem of being in this stupid place with nothing to do.  I don't want to work in Corporate America, and I don't want to commute to the college.  I mean I would go do one of those things if we were suddenly poor and in fear of losing the house or something like that.  But I've done enough stupid piddly jobs and volunteer gigs since getting married, I hated them all and am not looking forward to something else I'll dislike if I don't have to.

*sigh*

And what if I'm only resisting working because of what a workaholic Hitter is?  More rebellion.  

I just want to take a deep breath and tell the whole world 

But I can't.  I'm trapped here.