Stuck In The Middle

HA!
I was going to choose a much more sensible picture until
I saw this and knew it had to happen! (Source)

I recall a conversation with a friend of mine once regarding a comment I made about my (then) boyfriend, something along the lines of me not understanding why he seemed to have no ambitions to move out of a job he didn't really get treated very well in and didn't get paid enough for, why, even though he knew it was unfair, he didn't do anything about it. Her response was something like "Well it's coz all his friends are still in uni and therefore he's better off than us all. When we graduate next year and get jobs and move out he might get a kick up the arse because he'll no longer be best off any more."

Of course by the time my graduation rolled around he was no longer my boyfriend, so all of that is by the by and I am none the wiser about his life choices. The reason I bring it up though is because I think I'm experiencing something of that same effect only in reverse. As I mentioned, I graduated in July last year with no idea what I wanted to do with myself from that point. I still don't. In the seven months since that day, I've been employed for two of them in a temporary part time job and the rest I've basically bummed around for.
So many of my friends are still students, studying at the university I'd still be in if I could, living in the city that I love that I think some part of my brain refuses to accept that it has to be an adult about these things and continues to live vicariously though all my friends. I still don't consider myself an adult, not really, not compared to my friends who are getting proper jobs and getting married and having children, I still think I'm a student, and only need a part time job in a bar to get by. I'm 22 years old and I am living exactly the same way as I was when I was 16ish, only without the distraction of college 4/5 times a week.

I don't really feel confident that I'd get a full time, proper adult job if I applied for them, whereas I know I can get a part time, unskilled one easy peasy, and so I tend to apply for those, inside my little comfort zone of ignorance. I want to move out of my parents' house, I really want to move back to Sheffield but I'm not doing anything that will facilitate these dreams in any way, because I still think I'm a student inside and nothing really matters much. I'm in this limbo state (now you understand the Hoff reference...) between being a student in that weird world that only exists when you're at university and being a proper real grown up, responsible for myself and pushing myself to achieve all the things I want to. I know that my future lies squarely in my hands, but I'm too scared to do anything with it, so I just curl back up under my quilt and hide away from the world. I don't really think I believe I can achieve anything, and am constantly disappointing myself.

And who knows, maybe in a few months time when all the rest of my friends have graduated and got themselves swanky proper jobs, when I realise that I'm bottom of the pile, maybe that will push me to get a grip on myself and sort something out for once. I can only hope so because otherwise I'll remain this useless person forever, and I really don't want that for myself. I want to make myself proud of me, it's just really hard sometimes.

-Jenni-