2007: A Year Truly Worth Forgetting

What can I say about 2007, other than it was a year like no other ... I'll ever experience in my entire life, I hope? I wish I was able to participate in the traditional Japanese "forget-the-year" festivities, but it looks like I'm gonna have to remember and live with what had happened this year indefinitely.

First of all, what the hell did I go through what I went through in Korea for? Why did I have to endure so much flat-out abuse, torment and absolute hatred that I spent most of my days there literally wishing I was dead? I had THOUGHT that it was to get experience so that I could go teach in Japan. Did that happen? No! NOVA just HAD to collapse, and I just HAD to be screwed out of a job at the same time. Good-bye, Japan, forever (other than maybe a vacation), because there's no other way in for a long period of time unless you're fluent in Japanese. That's not gonna happen here. What that means is that I went through all that for nothing. I suffered so much, but no good came out of it at all. What an incredible waste. It wasn't worth the effort and the abuse.

Then, the thing that happened in Japan itself. I came SO CLOSE to finally managing to find a future I could be happy with, and then it just HAD to be yanked away from me, leaving me without a future. (Before anyone suggests I apply for JET, AEON, GEOS or any of those other school chains, I have tried each and every one, and not only did I fail interviews with them, but also there are no more full-time teaching positions remaining in Japan for someone who does not already have a valid work visa, and given I'm unemployed and in America, it's pretty obvious that I do not have one.) People have been suggesting that I try voice acting. I'd love to do that. I'd pursue it like there was no tomorrow if it was possible. But, there's just one HUGE problem that absolutely kills that. Nevermind that I have no connections. I could be close personal friends with every single voice actor and every single person in the industry on the face of the Earth, and it'd still be an unattainable goal, considering I live in the middle of Wisconsin, over 800 miles from the nearest voice acting job market, and chances are my voice will have matured to the point that it is unusable in voice acting by the time I am in any position to move. So much for that. As for plan C, I ask, what plan C? Remaining a part-time job hopper? Being unemployed? Spending every day until I retire knowing that the best is behind and ending up with some crappy, thankless job that I hate doing and then coming home to the same old boring rut? Because unless things seriously fall into place soon, that's what my future holds. Unless there's something even better, than I'm probably never going to be truly happy again if I have to settle for such a fate as plan C.

There are only 17 hours left for 2007 to redeem itself. I doubt it's gonna happen, given all the catching up it has to do. It would take a miracle to salvage this year. When it all comes down to it, if I were to give this year a grade, the best it would get is a D-, but it would more than likely get an F. Any year in which I have to watch as my dreams crumble right before my eyes, leaving me no good options that could lead me to a bright future, the bright future I had worked so hard to try to achieve but is now completely unattainable, doesn't deserve a passing grade in my book.

I can't wait for the new year so that I can put this awful year behind me and hope that in 2008, SOMETHING comes along so that I have something to aim for in life.

A lack of hidden fees isn't enough to make it joyous

Chrismahanukwanzakah is tomorrow, and I just can't seem to get myself out of this sadness ... I'm just heading absolutely nowhere in life. I don't have the talent in any aspect to do anything well enough to gain a decent future, and 2007 has been by far the single worst year of my entire life. Any year that involves me having to take constant abuse for 5 whole months straight and then getting SO CLOSE to finally achieving my dreams only to have had them crushed right before my eyes and then topping it all off with being fired from a CASHIER'S position after only THREE WEEKS can only be classified as a disaster and a total loss, and I've given up on any hope that it's going to end on a positive note, since nothing can turn around this absolutely horrible year other than a miracle, and with just half a month left, I'm not holding my breath. The only good thing that happened in 2007 really was that I got to go to Japan for the last time in my entire life, and all I have to show for my struggle is $1700 worth of debt that I have no way to pay off and a wish that I had never even been put on this Earth. That and a complete lack of any path that I can possibly take now that I'll never become fluent in Japanese (it's not gonna happen in America, and to be in Japan long enough to become fluent, I've gotta get a job there first, which now is impossible without fluency in Japanese) and I live somewhere where the only other thing I don't suck at (voice acting) has no market available, leaving me with literally no options as far as me going anywhere in life. I know I have said this before, but I am positive that the best is behind. There are very few ways that 2008 can be worse than 2007, but I'm not holding my breath for it or any other year in the future to provide something even better than what's already in the past. I'm probably going to spend the rest of my life not satisfied, having come so close to fulfilling my dreams only to have them suddenly become impossible, and never finding anything better or as good, knowing that my peak is in the past already at the tender age of 23. The best is already over; what's left to aim for? What's left to motivate me? What can I even work towards now? I don't have anything to even go towards, no path for me. There is literally nowhere I belong in this world and nothing I belong doing. There is no place for me in the world.

Santa, I know that you're just a trademark of the Coca-Cola Company, but do you think that you could maybe lay a decent future for me under the tree, or at the very least the means to get one and some actual evidence that I actually DO have something that's as good as or better than what's in my past ahead of me?

Holiday cheer, how I desperately search for you ...

This past month and a half, I've felt like absolute garbage. I want to be happy, especially since it's the holiday season (my favourite time of the year, even), but I just can't seem to dig myself out of this incredible feeling of sadness I've felt after seeing my future and my dreams collapse before my eyes. I still don't see any sort of future ahead of me, and even worse, my hopes of going back to Japan for more than just a vacation have been pretty much dashed, since there isn't any way for me to continue to study the language anymore since I've exhausted all the classes that are available, and I can't practise with anyone since no one else I know speaks Japanese well enough for me to do so, leaving me struggling to keep it on life support. With that gone, I don't think there's even anything that's ahead of me that can hold a candle to what I have experienced already. I just wish I could find some sort of hope ...

This Christmas, I am asking for a good future to be ahead of me -- something I can look ahead to in life. Right now, it seems like the best is behind me, and there's nothing ahead of me to look to in the future.