It feels like life is rushing past me and I’m not on the train. People around me are working, getting married, having kids, actually living, and it makes me feel left behind a lot.

It’s been almost a year since I was “let go” from my last job. The economy was pretty terrible (it’s slightly better now, I hear), and I was really bitter about being forced into such a crappy hiring environment. It’s difficult for me to believe that I haven’t had a job for a year, especially because I thought that I would have no problem at all finding something.

I’m a smart woman in my late 20s. I have a master’s degree from an excellent university, where my grade point average for grad school was 3.98 and I was in the honors society. I was a Girl Scout for 13 years. I volunteered for Habitat for Humanity. I’m technologically savvy (to a point). I can speak a fair amount of Spanish. I traveled to El Salvador for an outreach project when I was in college. In short (and screw modesty, because that does not get you anywhere these days), I am pretty great on paper, and awesome in person. In the past year, I’ve learned that none of that means jack unless you know someone in a position of power.

I used to have a timeline of my life that I was going to stick to, no matter what. (Hahahahahahahahahahaha.) I’ve recently realized that if I want to be a happy person right now, I need to stop thinking about being happy at some point in the near future.

I don’t believe in higher powers, or “waiting for a sign,” or “it’s a test,” or any of that. I do, however, think I deserve more, and so I’ll work harder towards the things I think I deserve. Serendipity seems to have a pretty firm grasp on me, so maybe while I’m working hard towards something, an unexpected new thing will come my way. Life is weird, and pretty awesome sometimes. (Right now might not be one of those times.)