I Want
Lately, I’ve been lost in my head. Daydreaming. Longing. Wishing I had a time machine or some such device that would let me be young again. It’s not that I want to relive my youth, my glory days, per se. I don’t want to repeat history — I got my ya ya’s out before settling down, had a good long stint of married life before having kids. Theoretically, I did everything right and yet, I find myself wishing for something I’ll never have again — a carefree life; a life where the future is but a vague concept; a life where fun is the only thing that matters.
I want to get dressed up to go out at midnight. I want to drink without worrying about a hangover. I want to be reckless. I want to sneak backstage and party with the band. I want to hang out of a car window while screaming my head off. I want to go to late night after parties and make out with someone cute that I’ll never see again. I want to go out to breakfast at 4am and giggle uncontrollably because my friends are tripping too hard to order. I want to meet weird people and have deep conversations with them over too many drinks and too many cigarettes. I want my posse of crazy girlfriends and all the drama that comes with them. I want to flirt with lanky, long-haired boys that have no money or prospects. I want to take roadtrips without any advance planning and too many people in the car. I want to be seduced. I want to get love letters. I want bootycalls. I want to have an urgent need to go to the record store because I just heard the most amazing song. I want to live on pizza and saltine crackers. I want to be idealistic. I want to be as skinny as I was when I thought I was fat. I want to come home at dawn with five other people in tow and pile onto my bed and sleep with them. I want to feel the feeling of having a crush. I want to feel that feeling of kissing someone in a way that makes you ache with desire. I want to rage against the machine. I want to LIVE.
It’s not that I hate the life I have. I wouldn’t change it for anything. But at heart, I’m a restless soul. I always want more from life than is possible. And this thing…this daydream that won’t stop, this longing — how do I make it go away?
You can call it whatever you want — a mid-life crisis, a housewife’s lament, whatever. Just tell me I’m not the only one who’s ever felt this way.
Do you? Have you?
73 Responses
to “I Want”
3 Trackback(s)
-
-
-
A while back (probably 10 years now, sheesh) one of my friends asked why I still watched MTVs The Real World. I said it made me nostalgic for a time when I was young and when my little problems all seemed so important. He said “You’re nostalgic for a lack of perspective?” and I think that is part of it. To not know limits. To feel like it IS all about you. To not know better.
nope. never felt that way. have no sense of what you mean. none whatsoever.
*yelps in pain as nose suddenly blasts in length and bumps into ‘puter screen*
I did NOT get my ya’s out before “Real life” hit and I still find what I yearn for is to have that ignorance of real, crushing responsibility and the vast opportunities that stretch out in front of you when you’re young.
You’re not the only one who’s ever felt that way.
You’re not the only one who’s ever felt that way.
You’re not the only one who’s ever felt that way.
You’re not the only one who’s ever felt that way.
You’re not the only one who’s ever felt that way.
You’re not the only one who’s ever felt that way.
You’re not the only one who’s ever felt that way.
You’re not the only one who’s ever felt that way.
Seriously.
i have been feeling that way for a few weeks now. it hits me about this time every year. i came to japan in late july, so august (and early september, when i started work) reminds me when i was on my own, no one to answer to and really out of my element.
i miss it!
I want to have never read this and have to go through those feelings again this week…
I want to not be so responsible for someone else all the freaking time. Just one day all by myself, with no to do list.
You’re not the only one. I think about that stuff all the time.
The want of staying out till 5 am and not have to worry about ANYTHING.
The want of going for a walk & see where it takes me (even if it takes all day).
The want, the want, the want. It’s very much there, at times more than others.
Every. Flippin. Day. I so agree with Catnip… what I wouldn’t do for one day of freedom. Oh who am I kidding - give me a week!!!
That painful craving is the thing, IZZY! Don’t make it go away. Pour gas on that fire.
You are so many someone elses. Be a few.
They don’t have to be self-destructive. That’s just the imagery that accompanies transformation. Be another.
Even I, who have always liked being cautious and controlled in my choices and actions, have had times and things that made me wish I was different or in a different place. I would have loved to follow my favourite band around on tour once, for the road trip and the experience and the fun of hearing them every night or two. I would love to take a real road trip with girlfriends. Hell, I would love to just go out one night and stay out too late and not have to pay for it the next morning. But not right now.
Everyday.
Every Single Day.
You’re not the only one. I think about that stuff all the time.
The want of staying out till 5 am and not have to worry about ANYTHING.
You are so not alone. So not alone. We all want that, I think, the freedom we had back when we took it for granted. Now that we know what it truly means, it’s all we want. A chance to really relish it for what it is.
I try to get into as much trouble as I can when the opportunity presents itself. Like Wednesday night. A bunch of us work peeps went out for someone’s birthday, and we all got trashed. Super trashed. At work the next day, we were all a little off our game, but I’d catch their eyes and we’d smile that smile- that triumphant little grin.
I smell a roadtrip, Izzy. :)
All the time.
You nailed it.
BUT, I might have a solution for one of those issues:
“I want to meet weird people and have deep conversations with them over too many drinks and too many cigarettes”
Yeah, I’m thinking that one’s going to happen sooner than you think.
I was just lamenting my own feelings of “not enough” yesterday, especially. I just feel so uninspired and so, well, bored. I don’t know what kind of change I need, but i think I need something… I don’t want to change the fact that I’m a stay at home wife and mother, but I just get so tired of the day-in, day-out crap. It’s uninspiring, it’s tedious and it’s as boring as hell. I don’t have the answers, though. If you find any, let me know!
Every day girl, every day. You should start a club where parents get to do this kinda stuff together.
They would take turn baby sitting while the rest go out on the town for a night of debauchery.
it’s called you need a vacation, not with your family. You need a “YOU vacation”, maybe with a girlfriend, maybe by yourself… but you need to go. If only for a weekend.
I mean don’t get me wrong it won’t totally cure the whole thing but it will remind you why you grew up in the first place.
I am so with you! I’ve been feeling this way too and I’ve a been a bit embarrassed because I truly I wouldn’t change anything. I have a wonderful husband and I love our life. But damn how cool would it be to just take off with a bunch of wild gals and road trip like we were 20. Only we have more money now! Let’s go!
You’re not the only one.
Most of us do,and its what keeps us ticking..living those old memories and wondering if this is all there is. And of course, we wouldn’t change a thing however, its fun thinking we might..even if its for only a moment…
Hugs Dorothy from grammology
grammology.com
I could have written this exact list.
WOW. I miss that sh*t.
If I could fit this all on a tee-shirt I’d wear it. And then rip it off.
Yep. Been there, done that. Although last year, when my husband was on his paid vacation to Afghanistan, i got to do a lot of that. It was very interesting and enlightening… and i enjoyed the hell out of it. But i am, i can say with total honesty, glad to have my sober, stable, ordinary family life back. That kind of lifestyle requires an enormous expenditure of energy and cash lol. I completely understand how you feel tho.
FINALLY — someone who put into words exactly how I’ve been feeling. I want to know - how do I make it STOP?
I can’t leave my name because I don’t want the people closest to me to know how I feel, which is a bit like how you feel. They just wouldn’t understand the feeling of dying a little on the inside with each passing day that’s the same as every other day. No fun. No excitement. Nothing to look forward to. I have dreamed, literally, of having a illicit affair or running away from my life and touring the world with my favorite band or being 19 again (but in today’s world which is infinitely more interesting than when I grew up.) and having a cute emo boyfriend. I could go on and on. I’m pathetic, I know. You couldn’t judge me any harder than I judge myself.
I think everybody feels this way sometimes. It sounds to me like you need to do something different for yourself, away from your responsibilities.
A weekend trip with an old friend you haven’t seen in a while, far away from your family, or a skydiving lesson, or just something to shake things up.
All the time, I think it’s only natural. And judging by the responses you’ve gotten I guess it really is! I went through it really bad last year and finally settled down a bit. But yeah, it would be nice to have some freedom, some ignorance and definitely lack of responsibility!
I dunno, I think I lived hard and fast already - I kinda don’t miss it.
@ Heather Pride
I don’t think I’ll ever NOT miss having fun. Maybe it depends on how old you are and how long you’ve been away from it or how much your life isn’t your own anymore.
In my case the answers are old, a long time and not at all :)
Sometimes I want to start over. I mean really over. No hubby, no house, no kids. Travel and be the photographer my secret soul wanted to be. Then my kids hug me and hubby smiles and it’s all okay again. But for those few daydreaming wanting moments, that’s what I want.
It’s good to want. It keeps us reaching for that next dream.
I feel the similarly and in the same breath, I feel like a traitor to all the people I love in my real life, like wanting something different is saying I don’t want them and that’s not the case. I wish I could be two people at once. A young me to live life to the fullest and not care about tomorrow and a me to live and love the pretty great life I have.
If you find that time machine, take me with you. They were good times, weren’t they? French fries and ranch dressing and all.
I mostly do not ever want to go back to any decade I have already survived. (Ha!) However, I do from time to time wonder what 1 a.m. looks like hanging out of a car window, giggling and screaming with my girlfriends as you have so aptly described.
Thanks for stopping by my blog. You’re probably more of the top of Gen Xer I’d read vs. the other Florida blogger. I chose him though b/c his schtick is so GEN X. I’ve book marked you though, b/c I’m probably going to rotate the blogs on my list every six month. That way we keep the GEN X dialogue going. ANy other suggestions form other states I don’t have?
I don’t think you want it to stop. If you didn’t want anything out of life because you did it all and have no desire to do it again, then what would you do?
Try and do some of thiose things again, don’t let fear dictate your life.
At least that is what I tell myself every day.
I work for DonorsChoose.org, an award-winning nonprofit that connects public school teachers in need of resources with donors via the internet. At DonorsChoose.org, called the “future of philanthropy” by the New York Times, public school teachers describe needs for their classrooms and donors can search projects by area of interest and choose to fund the project(s) he/she finds compelling.
In the fall, DonorsChoose.org holds an annual “Blogger Challenge” – bloggers choose specific projects from our website and challenge their readers to make donations.
A DonorsChoose.org Blogger Challenge is VERY easy to set up – it can take less than 5 minutes. In short, you are able to customize your own DonorsChoose.org page by selecting your favorite teacher projects. You can add a message and set a fundraising goal, then link the page to your blog and call your readers to action. Click here to see a list of completed challenges. This will give you a good idea of how it works.
Last year we raised $500,000 for needy classrooms via 50 bloggers including Engadget, Tomato Nation, LifeHacker and Stephen Colbert.
The classroom projects run the gamut from basic needs like books to LCD Projectors; in fact there are 489 Florida projects currently posted.
On October 1, we’ll kick off this year’s Blogger Challenge. We would be honored to add Izzy Mom to the list. I know you have a great reader base, and your participation could help hundreds of needy public school students.
DonorsChoose.org has been recognized with the Amazon.com Nonprofit Innovation Award, Fast Company’s “Social Capitalist Award” two years in a row, and the 2007 Crunchie “Most Likely To Make The World A Better Place” Winner.
If you are interested in participating, I would be happy to share more details with you. Your support would be GREATLY appreciated!
Thank you for your consideration,
Natalie French
natalie at donorschoose.org
Girl, I feel ya. I completely understand this post.
For me—— to make plans on the spur of the moment & follow through with them. Rather than having too much to do (too tired, too expensive, whatever), and trying to think of a way to get out of the obligation.
just to shake off this mantle of responsibliity, just for a little while.
I don’t miss those fast and wild days of my youth, but I surely miss the no responsibility thing. It’s Mom Fatigue, plain and simple. Wouldn’t it be fun to just live a day or two without having to account to or for someone else?
Sigh.
I want those exact same things at exactly the same moment.
All the damn time, and I’m still in college.
I think I am probably too scared to reach for it.
Omigod. You absolutely positively totally hit the nail on the head how I feel. I love where I am now… but there were lots of good things about back then, too…
There are two types of people, those that feel the same way you do (to some degree or another), and those that are in denial.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BETCH!
Izzy, I felt this way, acted on it and it destroyed my marriage. I had a year of being single and carefree two days a week when i didn’t have my kids. Know what? It was fun.
Now, i’m married again and struggling to give p that little bit of freedom and youth i experienced.
I don’t think it ever goes away.
God, yes. I know I can’t ever go back to those days - REALLY go back - and certainly not without sacrificing what’s most important to me.
But that doesn’t mean I don’t still think about how much I’d love to try.
I want some of that too sometimes.
Then I look at friends who still have that, and then I’m thankful I’m not them.
i only had my son 6 months ago, but i relate to this post… utterly. i have related to it for many years!! i fell in love and moved in with my boyfriend/husband when i was almost 20, that was almost 8 years ago. i think that the craziness is kind of gone once you get into the long term situation… even though i was in my 20’s i didn’t do any of that stuff anymore. i feel like i kind of got my ya ya’s out (or whatever you call it) when i was really young- but it’s just a messed up feeling. a weird feeling. my husband feels it to!! when he had separate vacations and things like that- it didn’t fix anything. my craziness appetite was totally not fulfilled and it just couldn’t be- i was in a committed relationship, i felt very straight laced or something… it’s a really difficult feeling. and i guess it’s just part of adult hood, unless you are like a trust fund kid that can extend their care free travels longer than the average person?? but still, i wouldn’t trade. so i guess the grass is always greener on the other side. i honestly missed my husband and felt out of place when i was on my own trips, so i must be doing alright. thanks for the post, i really appreciated it! (well- all of them actually).
I work at the university where I earned my undergrad degree. The school year just started and once again I’m faced with a sea of young faces who are just starting to explore the world. I envy them in a way. I envy them for their hope and determination. I envy their optimism and the feeling that they can and will achieve their dreams.
I don’t wish to go back 20 years and do it all over again, but I do wish I could recapture the feeling of possibility and of imagining that my life could be whatever I wanted it to be.
You are definitely not alone. I think a lot of us feel this way at some point or other.
I have no regrets, but what I wouldn’t give to go back and be young and restless and wild all over again.
I totally understand where you are coming from. It would be so nice to not have to committ half my life to working to make a living, to pleasing other people all the time, to giving in to others’ demands whether I want to or not.
I feel ya’.
You’re not the only one…wait, I think someone else said that already, lol! Seriously, we can’t go back but there must be a way to fit in a wild weekend or two sometime so we can feel less restless, right?
You are SO not alone in this!!! Being mom and taking care of the responsibilities (and working) gives me the urge to indulge my wild side sometimes…. It would be SO nice not to have responsibility and to be a bit reckless…. the only thing that gets me through these phases is to indulge in small ways… Like taking a daylong adventure without a plan — get in the car and drive and see where the day takes you. I also have days where I refuse to make decisions…. even on where and what to eat. Sometimes it is nice to go with somebody else’s flow rather than direct my ship. Where I find my peace though is at water…. listening to a tide can calm my soul and resolve my discontent….
I didn’t do half that shit when I had the opportunity, LOL.
I love this post.
Ditto.
I want to drink without wondering how many calories are in the drink and whether I have scheduled time to work out in my new mommy-week.
I am in probably the happiest, most satisying marriage I know of and while we may not be having a lot of sex, or get as many date nights out as we need (is a Target run on a Saturday night a date?) I love my life, my husband, my son and the baby who is on the way.
Yet last night, I dreamt that my husband was no longer around (I think he had passed on and I had finally moved on and was healing in the dream) and the actor Jeff Daniels and I had mutual friends. We met at a friend’s weekend house and even though he knew I had two kids and the body of a perpetually size 16 woman and the boobs of a woman who birthed two children, he was courting me.
What a dream. I felt beautiful and NEWLY wanted and so charmed by the entire encounter. And I woke up. Next to the man who tells me weekly that I am more beautiful than the day he met me (which I cannot believe yet but am working on) and who adores me to my core.
It is the newness I miss. The newness of holding hands in a movie theater for the first time. The newness of that first kiss, the fireworks during the first make-out session, the moment after “I love you” has been said for the first time.
And don’t even get me started about the longing to travel. I have decided that when the baby inside me is 5, I am going back to Paris ALONE for 8 days…just me and myself and the illusion of separateness and independence.
I hear you sister. Loud and clear.
Thanks.
have you been listening to my phone conversations? my god. i feel EXACTLY the way you do. So appreciative for my amazing life and so desperate for freedom.
it’s the first kiss that kills me. We all want the first kiss again. Sigh…
Izzy, I love you. I bought underwear with lacey tops too just a few weeks ago after my GYN told me I needed a biopsy of my uterus. And why oh why did I not do this before I needed my biopsy. That was my very question to myself. In fact, I’m going out to buy more after reading your underwear entry. Now as for the wild stuff: It can still be done with or without moderation. Not sure how old your kids are. Mine were 10, 15 and 18 when I took off in the car last year (with some warning but little planning) and told my husband didn’t know when I was coming back, which he knew I needed to say and was OK with. Took all my favorite music and just drove for eight hours round and round til I found a hotel on Lake Erie I wanted to park in, which I did for four days. Hardly talked to my husband, which was pre-planned and understood. He knew I needed the freedom and was respectful. BTW< I also do Latin salsa, play African drums and drink heavily til 4 am. with friends when I want to. Sometimes I even flirt. If you don’t allow yourself a little of this freedom, you will explode.
Love this post.
Was married for 20 years then he didn’t want to be married anymore. Never had kids…never wanted them.
So yeah…the life you describe? I sorta kinda have it. Not the being skinny part. And I do have a mortgage and a full-time and a part-time job. Stupid economy, ya know?
I hang out with the most awesomest people and do the coolest things and am thankful every single second for my ability to get up and GO and not be tied to much of anything. The huge majority of my friends are late teens to mid-30’s and I get so much from their friendships and attitude that it’s given me a whole new lease on life.
Yay for being strong enough to start over and yay for friends who keep you young.
(Not saying you should start over…this is only my perception about my situation)
:)
I want to have the thrill of the chase - just one. more. time. Not alone and I think we need to do a roadtrip together ASAP.
Hell yes! Not every day, but often enough. I want to be wild, to leave all this mommysponsibility behind for a while and just be FREE. It’s almost primal at times, this want of mine. I miss just cutting loose and don’t get to do it nearly often enough!
Great post. You obviously touched a lot of people!
Me too, exactly as you say! Its painful isn’t it? And I disagree that you can do some of that stuff now…its not the same when the family is waiting home for you. BUT…I suspect we will have more freedom than we know what to do with when the kids hit their teens, and though we would look silly screaming out the car window, we will probably rejoice in our freedom in another, equally satisfying way. This tough routine of diapers and itsy bitsy spider and math homework will taper off and then, its a whole new ballgame.
PS just today I was thinking that what I am missing is the sense of possibility. That the future is wide open before me and I could choose any path.
You’re not the only one. i am too!
This is the most eloquent description of these feelings I’ve ever heard. And that includes in my own head. Reading through your list made me smile, a really big, rememeber-those-days-and-nights-smile, even as my heart was breaking. So well said.
You are not the only one…..I’m a restless soul also
My life is just so full, this feeling is foreign to me. The fact that I don’t have this feeling is curious to me, though. Am I just too busy to be missing anything??
This is why my husband and I are going on a 4-day, 3-night vacation to Jamaica, SANS toddler, in December! So we can do some of these things without a care in the world! I was feeling guilty for leaving our son at home, but you know what? WE NEED THIS. I dream of reading magazines on the beach without a worry of time, and an all-inclusive drink in hand ;)
First, I love this post. Second, get out of my head. Sometimes I think I’ll never be as happy and excited as I was during college and at the beginning of my career. I wish I could say, “but…”
But there is no but. Contentment and happiness are not the same thing, but at this age either beats the alternatives.
So very often…one of the reasons we bought a fast car.
I want to not be 22 and wanting for the same things…
*sigh*
I stumbled on this and can so relate. I have a wonderful life, 3 great kids, a husband I love dearly, things are really awesome. Yet there is that longing for the freedom of years past. I am fast approaching 4-0 and just missing the carefree life of the past. I find myself getting excited when I find an old boyfriend on Facebook and share a little banter. It makes me feel exciting and fun again. I miss feeling that way, when things are new and there is mystery and unknown about what’s around the corner.