Something To Do

Last night, for the second time in a week, I got so drunk that I was unable to take the time to undress myself before I fell into unconsciousness on my bed. Should I be worried? No. Not yet anyway. I do, however, desperately need something to take the place of alcohol in my life. In the last couple of months I've been drinking quite a lot on my own. Not because I have a desire to get drunk or, more accurately, to lose sobriety, but because I have nothing better to do. I don't know what this says about me but whatever it is it isn't healthy. I need a project, something to occupy my free time. It will help when I finally get online at home but I feel that will only be taking away the symptoms of whatever my malaise is rather than addressing the underlying cause.

Here follows a list of some of the things that I could do with my spare time:

- Charity work
- Get fit
- DIY
- Write a book
- Build model airplanes
- Get a girlfriend
- Write a song

All worthy suggestions, yes? But even as I typed them I was thinking of reasons not to do the very things I was suggesting to myself. Some were good reasons. For example, it's pointless me trying to write a song as there are loads of other people out there doing it who are far better than me which kind of makes it a bit pointless from where I'm sitting. And I don't find model airplane building or DIY even remotely alluring.

These points ignore the main reason I have for not doing stuff and that reason is that doing stuff requires effort and application, two things that I lack. I just find it very difficult to convince myself that doing anything is a good idea. Why would I, for example, want to write a story when I have hundreds of other stories sitting on my bookshelves written by very talented people? What is the attraction in making something when I can buy that very same thing cheaply in a shop?

There seems to be, in people other than me, satisfaction to be had in just doing stuff. A sense of achievement when a project is followed through to its completion. A feeling of self-worth to be gained from applying the skills that have been learned in life to doing something that makes our environment that little bit more bearable. Not for me. I can't remember the last time I felt a sense of achievement after having challenged myself to do something, although I imagine it might be when I was about eight years old and had just managed a hundred keep ups, or something like that. I really doubt whether there is much out there that I could do that would make me feel happy with myself or with life in general. This doesn't include spending time with my friends and family or listening to music or reading a good book. These things make me very happy but they're just recreation. They're not things that present me with a problem that needs me to resolve it. They're not situations that require my intervention to make them better.

All this makes for quite depressing reading, doesn't it? Is it a problem just with me or do many people feel like this? I really have no idea. Maybe I should write a book about it. Now, that would be something. But I bet someone else has done it already.