Becoming

Earlier this week, two of my closest colleagues who happened to be my ex-housemates got promoted. Previously they were senior analysts, now they are associate managers. I am still an analyst after more than 1.5 years of working in this company. Well, they have been working there for more than three years, almost four years I think? But still. So this is what it feels like when your friends get a promotion. You feel left behind, not good enough, envious, every single negative thing.  Now, do not be bitter. Let's assess why you have these negative feelings. Feeling left behind because they are two of my closest friends in the office and now I feel kind of inferior around them. Well, come on. They are three and four years older than me and they have been working in the office for twice as long as me, so they truly deserve it. Not good enough  because they got promoted and I did not. Again, it is not because I am not good enough, but because they have the opportunity. There...

“I saw my life branching out before me like the green fig tree in the story. From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked. One fig was a husband and a happy home and children, and another fig was a famous poet and another fig was a brilliant professor, and another fig was Ee Gee, the amazing editor, and another fig was Europe and Africa and South America, and another fig was Constantin and Socrates and Attila and a pack of other lovers with queer names and offbeat professions, and another fig was an Olympic lady crew champion, and beyond and above these figs were many more figs I couldn't quite make out. I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig tree, starving to death, just because I couldn't make up my mind which of the figs I would choose. I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and, one by one, they plop...