My Mid-Life Crisis Lasted 30 Years
All the Things I Learned Along the Way
Yeah, that’s my mind, all twisted and wondering which end is up. It has been like that for over 30 years. I didn’t like who I was, what I was, where I was going. It’s hard searching for yourself for so many years. But there’s something about turning 75, going to Europe for the first time, publishing a book, losing everything on the computer, and getting Covid to bring a perspective to life.
I was the first person in my college graduating class to have a job before graduating. The previous February I signed a contract to teach in Hawaii. Dream job, right? I just didn't want to teach — at all, anywhere. I was resisting the ever-present visual disability that governed what I could and couldn’t do. But that disability put me through college with no debt. The state program was designed to help students who had limited career opportunities; for me it was pretty much “just teaching.”
A bit of a problem, since I already had a guaranteed job, but as my political science professor said, “How bad can teaching in Hawaii be?”
