confession 1

i am at work. but i am not working. lately, i sit at my desk and work hard at avoiding my work. i search for obsure web pages about creative writing, foucauldian theory, soon-to-be-published books by favorite authors, graduate programs in politics, and miscellanea. i sit with scrunched up eyes, trying to push out some story idea or character for the novel i want to write. (writing a novel is something that people who don't want real jobs aspire to do, which often results in the kind of shit that populates the shelves of my local chapters bookseller.) i wonder if i should quit my job and try to get a new one. am i selfishly (i keep the job for fear of being unpaid, for fear of finding something worse -- the job is not bad, it is not hard, it suits my schedule and my routine, and i have good friends here) holding on to a position that is teaching me nothing new, that i neglect from sheer boredom of the work? should i let the work go to someone who could and wants to do a better job? probably. but will i? probably not. after all, what if my next job (assuming i get one -- my degrees are in political science and history, for goddess's sake) doesn't allow me the time and flexibility to write emails to friends in different countries, jot down thoughts on my blog, or surf the net for another reason to ridicule george bush? what could be wrong with that?