31 Today

That is the name of Aimee Mann's latest song. When I'm 31, in about 8 years, I'm supposed to be giving birth to my youngest child, and a girl at that. Its a tradition with the women in my family. If I don't continue the honestly accidental tradition, I will feel slightly unmagical. For it really is completely unplanned. My great-grandmother had my grandmother (the youngest and a girl), she my mother, and my mother me.
But that's not what this was going to be about.
When I'm 31, I don't want to be singing the lyrics to this song. Because if I am, it would mean I would be still stuck in the quagmire of retail, a new glaze of sorrow and giving-up applique applied to my gifted mind, potential deteriorating.
While I strive to become more laid-back, I never want to lose the passion of a driven girl. A girl bent on dreaming and pursuing. But, working retail will kill you. It will kill your soul.
This last sip of $3.76 Target Clearance Zinfandel is for you, you who are stuck in crappy wage jobs that mean nothing. May you find something that you enjoy and that fulfill you. If you aren't being challenged, you're probably not growing and your brain is dying. And that can' t be good. I hope you have the courage to pull up and out. Rip off your comfort cloak like a band-aid and go! I hate suburbia.

If I'm in the same spot I am now in 8 years, may I look back and know that I lost a lot of my minutes of my life. And I deprived you of my gifts. Dommage.

One element of retail that I hate the most is the incessant focus on body image. Isn't that what I'm supposed to be curing myself of? My epitaph will read, Miss Laura, who loved many, whose mood often depended on her perception of her appearance, and who wasted the time given to her and took not advantage of the blessings of family and upbringing for which she should have worked to repay. All of the hopes of her ancestors and close family rested on her, but she chose the easy way and was contented in a dressing room, cringing at fake nails and cell phones. She was contented because it was easy and she was tired of hard and more than happy to accept easy.

"You're thinking of me, the same old way
You were above me, but not today
The only difference is you're down there
I'm looking through you, and you're nowhere"
- the Beautiful Beatles

Lord, lead me from this monotony.