Running Away From Home

[Denyoz]

I woke up this morning wanting to run away from home.  It's not the first time, but this morning the feeling was very strong.  I had to fight with it.

 

I bet a lot of people feel like running away from "home".

 

Why would we want to run away from our dwelling place?  What does "home" represent?  Problems, routine, boredom, bills, lack of freedom.  That's what I want to run away from.

 

But I'm a stay-at-home dad.  So the home is my workplace.  I bet people who work outside the home want to run away from their jobs.  When I was in school I wanted to run away from school.

 

I wonder what would happen if everybody decided to run away at the same time.

[TrueFreedom]

Sometimes I have a strong urge to run away from work and from home.  I really need to start planning regular vacations by myself.

[Guest Babylonian Dream]

I should vacation more, it would get rid of the urges I have to just wander off. To go somewhere else. Far away. Yes, I haz wanderlust.

[amateur]

We can all be hippies.  I've been thinking about this lately, as I agree that I'd like to get out of my stupid near minimum wage jobs where I've been working about 55 hours a week (with no overtime because it's two jobs cobbled together with varying hours, 7 days a week).  All that work just pays for the car to get me to my works (a necessity, could not do one of the jobs without a car), insurance on the car and house and health (neither job has health insurance), taxes (I have no mortgage, but pay the county, local, and school district taxes), utilities, and the basics (I don't even own a tv, so no cable bill, and no computer, I use one at one of my works).

 

Remember "Tune in, turn on, drop out"?  I've spent many work hours trying to figure out the dropping out part.

 

Want to start a commune?

 

Did this really work out well for the hippies?

[♦ ficino ♦]

Caring for a disabled, wheelchair-bound and incontinent partner whose razor-sharp mind is now much dulled, I sympathize, Denyoz.  I feel I get sort of isolated, as you probably do, too.  Some day your kids will be out of the nest!

[gall]

We can all be hippies.  I've been thinking about this lately, as I agree that I'd like to get out of my stupid near minimum wage jobs where I've been working about 55 hours a week (with no overtime because it's two jobs cobbled together with varying hours, 7 days a week).  All that work just pays for the car to get me to my works (a necessity, could not do one of the jobs without a car), insurance on the car and house and health (neither job has health insurance), taxes (I have no mortgage, but pay the county, local, and school district taxes), utilities, and the basics (I don't even own a tv, so no cable bill, and no computer, I use one at one of my works).

 

Remember "Tune in, turn on, drop out"?  I've spent many work hours trying to figure out the dropping out part.

 

Want to start a commune?

 

Did this really work out well for the hippies?

 

You have history to tell you how that worked out for the "hippies" most of them went to school became professionals and got relabeled yuppies who then gave birth to what would become the "hipster" of the modern day. The words neck beard comes to mind.

 

I am not sure if sarcasim here but I assumed not.

 

Go get a better job. If you can't with the skills you currently have go get more skills. Those only come from hard work. I am a scientist so maybe the work I have had to do is different than a successful salesman. Then again I would not want to talk to all those clients all day. Success is more than money and if you have so little money that all you do is work to make it ask yourself this... "am I an intelligent person?" if the answer is yes then I would try something else if what you have tried so far is not working.

 

Of course there is only the chance to try and no sure thing but trying is a better way to spend time.

 

All the communes I ever visited smelled like poop.

[Margee]

Caring for a disabled, wheelchair-bound and incontinent partner whose razor-sharp mind is now much dulled, I sympathize, Denyoz.  I feel I get sort of isolated, as you probably do, too.  Some day your kids will be out of the nest!

 

The mundane can be so mundane. Man, I hate the days I feel like this. We need to laugh a lot more. That's why I'm so foolish on the boards right now. I need to have a little fun. I totally understand Deny and I sympathize. I did not know how much my own state of mind would be until after I decided to look after my 92 year old MIL. I love her to 'death', but that's what I watch for 24/7 now. A dear human dying before my eyes. It can be so depressing and smothering. I have to do everything in my power to break up my day with some enjoyment. Most of the time - that is with you guys.

 

You talk about  feeling like you could lose your mind? Oh yes.

 

Oh.... To be free from responsibility!! No wonder we rack our credit cards up just to take a vacation!!! Oh well, We, still have a roof over our heads and a loaf of bread on the counter.

 

We need friends. We need hobbies. We need to exercise. We need to  keep posting to each other. We need to lift each other up. I'm goin' for a walk....that always makes me feel better......

 

I sincerely hope you are feeling a little better Deny.  

[florduh]

But I'm a stay-at-home dad.  So the home is my workplace.

 

There's the problem. Get out more often, you have cabin fever.

[amateur]

gall:  yeah, it was sarcastic.  Most hippies went on to become middle-America.  I do know a couple people that stuck with it and live in alternate, interesting ways, but definitely evolved from the original hippie ideas.  I'd totally suck living in a commune, tho, not just the poop issue but too much togetherness.  My situation does keep slowly improving.  Once upon a time I graduated from college and had a career, then quit to raise my kids.  After getting divorced I realized how much I had lost.  Getting a job at all, any job, wasn't easy and the career was history by that time.  I re-started, at age 40, with a 10-hour a week, minimum wage job.  I did get some schooling and it didn't work out (just go with me on that, it's really depressing).  I now have my two jobs and work every day (and it's no longer all manual labor, like the original 10-hour a week job was, so it's less painful on my aging body), but I do keep up on the bills, so I'm proud of that.  But I'd need time and money to get more training or schooling, which I don't have.  I do, however, have a lead on a third job that might actually get me a permanent day off a week!  I'm excited about that!

 

I was just running with Denyoz's original proposition of running away from home, and how that feeling can really wash over you at times.  Most everybody, I'm thinking, no matter how fascinating their job might be, has days where it all seems mundane, and running away to experience something new and different is tempting.  I don't think it's a bad thing to think about.  It can make you make changes in your life, or try something different, or even just look at your own life differently.  I was feeling pretty hopeless about my own life recently, glumly pondering "tune in, turn on, drop out," then this third job came to my attention.  Now it's not ideal, but I started thinking about it and it's workable.  I can do it!  I can adjust all my schedules to fit this in, and this one makes a bit more money and might eventually lead to health insurance at work!  So I decided I'm going to apply (I talked to the manager and am waiting on her to post it on-line at the end of this week so I can apply; she does want me to apply).  In the meantime, I was thinking how I could get a permanent day off EVERY WEEK if I took this third job!!!  So yesterday, to test out my theory of having a bit more time and a day off, I took two exercise classes at my gym after work (one of my jobs is at the gym, so I get a free membership).  I haven't taken classes there in ages, because my schedule is so erratic and I'm beat.  But just having that HOPE of a day off made me go, "I could do this every week!"  So I happened to have the evening off last night, which should coincide with my new schedule, and took the classes, one yoga and one zumba, and felt FABULOUS!!!  So, see, it did help me to think about the old hippie thing of "tune in, turn on, drop out" because it did open me up to a very different third job, and it made me take those exercise classes; it made me shake up the mundane rut I'd gotten into, just going to work every single day.

 

Gosh, I hope I get this third job.

 

Well, like the hippies also used to say, "It's a crazy world, man."  Yes, indeed it is.  Thirty years ago I graduated college with a double major and immediately started my career.  If you would have told me then, "In thirty years you'll be mopping floors and wiping butts (a quick synopsis of my current jobs)" I would have been like, NUH-UH!  Crazy world!

[Denyoz]

Sometimes I have a strong urge to run away from work and from home.  I really need to start planning regular vacations by myself.

 

Well, I'm glad to know that I'm not the only one.  Thanks TrueFreedom.  Your profile name is really inspiring, by the way.

 

I need regular vacations by myself too, like once a week.  Ok, once every two weeks, I'll be reasonable.

[gall]

gall:  yeah, it was sarcastic.  Most hippies went on to become middle-America.  I do know a couple people that stuck with it and live in alternate, interesting ways, but definitely evolved from the original hippie ideas.  I'd totally suck living in a commune, tho, not just the poop issue but too much togetherness.  My situation does keep slowly improving.  Once upon a time I graduated from college and had a career, then quit to raise my kids.  After getting divorced I realized how much I had lost.  Getting a job at all, any job, wasn't easy and the career was history by that time.  I re-started, at age 40, with a 10-hour a week, minimum wage job.  I did get some schooling and it didn't work out (just go with me on that, it's really depressing).  I now have my two jobs and work every day (and it's no longer all manual labor, like the original 10-hour a week job was, so it's less painful on my aging body), but I do keep up on the bills, so I'm proud of that.  But I'd need time and money to get more training or schooling, which I don't have.  I do, however, have a lead on a third job that might actually get me a permanent day off a week!  I'm excited about that!

 

I was just running with Denyoz's original proposition of running away from home, and how that feeling can really wash over you at times.  Most everybody, I'm thinking, no matter how fascinating their job might be, has days where it all seems mundane, and running away to experience something new and different is tempting.  I don't think it's a bad thing to think about.  It can make you make changes in your life, or try something different, or even just look at your own life differently.  I was feeling pretty hopeless about my own life recently, glumly pondering "tune in, turn on, drop out," then this third job came to my attention.  Now it's not ideal, but I started thinking about it and it's workable.  I can do it!  I can adjust all my schedules to fit this in, and this one makes a bit more money and might eventually lead to health insurance at work!  So I decided I'm going to apply (I talked to the manager and am waiting on her to post it on-line at the end of this week so I can apply; she does want me to apply).  In the meantime, I was thinking how I could get a permanent day off EVERY WEEK if I took this third job!!!  So yesterday, to test out my theory of having a bit more time and a day off, I took two exercise classes at my gym after work (one of my jobs is at the gym, so I get a free membership).  I haven't taken classes there in ages, because my schedule is so erratic and I'm beat.  But just having that HOPE of a day off made me go, "I could do this every week!"  So I happened to have the evening off last night, which should coincide with my new schedule, and took the classes, one yoga and one zumba, and felt FABULOUS!!!  So, see, it did help me to think about the old hippie thing of "tune in, turn on, drop out" because it did open me up to a very different third job, and it made me take those exercise classes; it made me shake up the mundane rut I'd gotten into, just going to work every single day.

 

Gosh, I hope I get this third job.

 

Well, like the hippies also used to say, "It's a crazy world, man."  Yes, indeed it is.  Thirty years ago I graduated college with a double major and immediately started my career.  If you would have told me then, "In thirty years you'll be mopping floors and wiping butts (a quick synopsis of my current jobs)" I would have been like, NUH-UH!  Crazy world!

 

Keep trying. Even with a good job I just go to work everyday. I do it for money nothing else. Wish I had been a botanist and it didn't work out like that. I would love to still try but the thought of competing with 25 year olds in that field doesn't sit well with me so I stay where I am. I think I need a new career lol.

 

Never to old to try another game. Look for opportunity everywhere and if you can't find it try and make it on your own. Maybe commune living had something to it. To bad I would have hated being around smelly people all the time

[TheSpiritualPilgrim]

Keep your head up brother!  I too have felt this way at times.  Just last week I remember thinking, "I should just get the hell out of here."  I'm not sure what the root of this is but I think it has to do with processing our deconversion and accepting the absurdity of a life of uncertainty.  With me sometimes I get too lost in my thoughts and I realize I need to go out and hang with some friends, or watch a mindless science fiction comedy.  Basically I need to get out of my head.  I went to a psychologist for a little while who was trying to teach me to catch my negative thought patterns and decide against continuing with thoughts that did not bring me peace.  Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.  When you catch yourself feeling isolated reach out like you did.  You are not alone my friend.   Hope you're feeling better.

[kolaida]

My parents hopped around from big city to big city even after my dad retired from the Air Force, they could not re-adjust their new "civilian" lives to the small city they had grown up in.  After several years of following my family around and feeling increasingly frustrated with it, I got rid of a ton of stuff, packed two suitcases and traveled for about a year, working at seasonal places where employees have on site housing with roommates; they take the rent and food out of your paycheck. A few beautiful places, and a couple more I would have liked to hit, but even with those places you start to feel you're going to stir crazy after a little while, people constantly quitting on a whim (including myself) and new people replacing them. Then you get tired of the other "transient" beings and even being a "transient" being because you have met a ton of people and become close to a few, but they are all over the map and you have no true home at all. 

 

On the flipside, I've had to resist the urge several times to toss some clothes and my two cats in my beater car and see if it makes it to the Southwest. My neighbor, who lived there for several years, also gets this urge and I've told her if she ever goes, I'd go with her. But she had an adult child and young grandchild here so I doubt that'll happen.  

 

It is hard to not want to just get up and leave. There's always that short, brief but exhilarating bit of time time where you can re-invent yourself, no one knows who you are, there's just something about anonymity, after all.   

[ExXex]

I have a daydream that one day I'll find some really out of the way patch of wilderness where I can run through the woods and do all that hippy stuff and wouldn't have any internet access but would occasionally materialise to see my friends and family and drive my car really fast on race tracks.

Buuut, that can come later, at the moment people need me to be here for them and I have other ambitions that require a lot of drudgery first to fullfill. I can still dream though!

 

I see it as I can run away from responsibilities all I like but I can never... run away from what I'd really be trying to get away from...

...myself. DUN DUN DUUUUUUUN.

[Denyoz]

I should vacation more, it would get rid of the urges I have to just wander off. To go somewhere else. Far away. Yes, I haz wanderlust.

 

Thank you Babylonian, you taught me a new word:  wanderlust.

[Denyoz]

Want to start a commune?

 

Commune is synonym to family.  No, I don't want to start another commune!  I want to run away from it.

[Denyoz]

Caring for a disabled, wheelchair-bound and incontinent partner whose razor-sharp mind is now much dulled, I sympathize, Denyoz.  I feel I get sort of isolated, as you probably do, too.  Some day your kids will be out of the nest!

 

Yikes!  I sympathize with you ficino.  When we commit to someone, we never know what we're getting into.  "Love will conquer all" we think.  But love is like the Christian God...  (no need to say more, that says it all).

 

I don't exactly feel isolated.  I feel trapped in other people's lives to the point where I don't feel I have one any more.  A life, that is.  Kids have this incredible capacity to suck it right out of you.

 

In 10 years the last one should be out of the nest.  I'll be an alcoholic by then.

[Denyoz]

I sincerely hope you are feeling a little better Deny.  

 

Thank you Margee.  Yes, I feel better now, talking about it helps.  I managed to escape to the library after dinner.  I'm in the "Quiet Zone" now, where kids are not allowed.  This is about as close to heaven as I can get.

[Denyoz]

Well, like the hippies also used to say, "It's a crazy world, man."  Yes, indeed it is.

 

We were all born into this crazy world and never really given a say in how society is run.  Everything has been decided and established by others who are now dead, but who apparently knew what they were doing.  When I was a kid I thought by the time I would reach adulthood I would understand why everything is the way it is and I'd be given opportunities to change the things I don't like.  It turns out that I was never given an opportunity to change anything.  Not anything significant anyway, like the banking and political systems, forget that.  I can change the clothes I wear and choose in which prison cell I wish to live in, that's about it.

 

Even the idea of running away doesn't make much sense.  Where would I go?  The authorities would find me one way or another.  I just have to submit and shut up, like everybody else.  Death sometimes seems like the only way out.  It will come, I can always comfort myself with that. 

[Denyoz]

Keep your head up brother!  I too have felt this way at times.  Just last week I remember thinking, "I should just get the hell out of here."  I'm not sure what the root of this is but I think it has to do with processing our deconversion and accepting the absurdity of a life of uncertainty.  With me sometimes I get too lost in my thoughts and I realize I need to go out and hang with some friends, or watch a mindless science fiction comedy.  Basically I need to get out of my head.  I went to a psychologist for a little while who was trying to teach me to catch my negative thought patterns and decide against continuing with thoughts that did not bring me peace.  Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.  When you catch yourself feeling isolated reach out like you did.  You are not alone my friend.   Hope you're feeling better.

 

Thank you TSP, very thoughtful of you.

 

Yeah, I know what you mean by "getting out of my head."  First I try to transmute my thoughts by changing the negative ones into positive ones, but often I just run out of fuel.  Positive thinking has it's limits.  So then I just stop thinking altogether, and go into FEEL mode:  feel the air I'm breathing, feel the comfortable armchair I'm sitting on, feel my nice hairy body soft furry cat...  The purpose of life is to feel good, isn't it?  That's what it all boils down to.

[RipVanWinkle]

A few years ago I made a dream come true. I had a break in my work and decided I was going to go on a trip by car with no destination and with over two weeks available. My wife (who has to plan 3 weeks for a 2 day trip) couldn't go because she didn't have enough advance notice. But I was desperate. I was stressed out.

 

So I leased a new auto (Acura) and took off heading north from Florida. It was May and the weather was great. I put over 7000 miles on the car and enjoyed every minute of it. No destinations, no reservations. At first I traveled on I-75 through Chattanooga, into Kentucky, Indiana and Illinois. I drove all the way north along the west shore of Lake Mich. in Wis. nearly to the Canadian.border. Then I headed west. Then i went to Minn. and took a similar type of route all the way to the shores of Lake Superior to the northernmost east- west highway in Minn. Then back south.Those 2 states are absolutely  beautiful in May. Then I slowly drove Detroit where I met my wife at the airport. We drove up north to a resort on the eastern shore of Lake Huron.

 

 

The whole trip took about 3 weeks. If you are a wanderlust as I am, you'd love it. It's not the destination; it's the travelling and the freedom.   bill

[amateur]

gall:  How about a commune with one rule:  "Mandatory Daily Showers with soap and shampoo"?  Ha ha!

 

"Most men live lives of quiet desperation."  -- Thoreau   I read Walden as a teenager and didn't totally get it (because I was a teenager).  I wasn't going to live a quietly desperate life!  Not me!  Even as a young adult I was really enjoying my life.  College, the start of my career, being newly married, having a baby.  All so cool and I felt like I was making my own life!  Then . . . life happened.  The marriage fell apart.  I got divorced.  Desperately needed a job.  The kids felt like a huge burden and I still had ten years until they were 18 (sorry, kids, love you!), so couldn't just pick up and move away.  Got a job but not enough to live on.  Got additional jobs til lots of my waking hours were used up, just to pay for the basics of my life.  Ok, definitely quiet desperation time.

 

So, I could just let it go on and suffer quietly, or see if I could come up with some ideas while still being a responsible mom.  Sex helped, and I had tons of that at night when the kids were safely asleep with their dad.  But one thing that really helped, Denyoz, was one day I drove an hour down the road to a little town, found a B&B, and spent the night there.  Alone.  Took myself to dinner, had a lovely breakfast in the morning.  Sat on the front porch of the B&B and watched the school bus picking up kids and thought, "Ha ha ha, not my kids!" (sorry, kids, love you!)  Strolled around the town, spent some time in my room listening to soothing cd's that were there, stopped for a drink on the way home.  That one day seriously felt like a week.  And nobody really missed me!  I started doing that every few months -- cost next to no money, could squeeze it in with my schedule, and the kids were fine without me for that time (always safe at home with their dad).

 

I realized I could have (and should have) done that while I was married and being a stay at home mom, which would have helped with my sanity on many levels (still would have got divorced, but it would've been a wonderful break).  In fact, one time when I stayed there, another lady was also staying there, and that's exactly what she did.  Once or twice a year she'd stay there overnight and just relax.  She and her husband had six kids, so that was her much-needed break!

 

If this is at all possible for you, I really recommend it.  Or any other break -- ACTUAL, AT-LEAST OVERNIGHT BREAK -- that would be enjoyable for you.  And do you have any regular nights out with friends?  I also failed at that until I got divorced, and that also helped my sanity.  A few hours with NO CHILDREN does wonders.  Date nights with the spouse are good, but you also need time with friends, otherwise you end up talking to your spouse about the kids on your date night.  Time with friends with NO KID TALK is rejuvenating.  

 

Being a stay-at-home parent is inexplicable -- it's wonderful and horrible, all mixed together!  It seems to take for-flippin'-ever, but when it's done (my youngest is now 19) you wonder where the time went.  Even though I killed my career and now work 7 days a week, I would NOT give up the experience of actually having gotten to BE THERE every day when my kids were young and we could roam around and explore things as long as we wanted as we generally had no schedule (we all loved being outside), but I could not imagine spending that much time with young children again!

 

Denyoz, come up with something fun to do, anything at all that doesn't involve kids, and do it, and let us know how it went!

 

My thoughts are most definitely with you!