Ungrateful, I owe you all

Tonight I feel like I will never be able to pay my debts, and I mean more than the Himalayas of my credit card balance. I mean all the kindnesses and generosities and allowances given to me by friends and parents of friends and parents and grandparents and uncles and the occasional shopkeeper, especially during all of this year.

Tonight I also feel ungrateful. These two feelings together make for a particularly desperate night.

Tomorrow I start my new job. I don't feel excited, which makes me nervous. I guess it's just been months of disappointments and shocks and difficulties, so I'm staying neutral, I guess. It also just seems impossible that this would come true. Why did they choose me? Aren't these jobs supposed to be terribly hard to get? Don't they pretty much not exist? I'm going to be working for a national glossy mag with 2 million circulation and a great reputation. This is me; they chose me.

I also don't entirely know what I'm going to be doing, or if the people will be nice, and I interviewed so so long ago I'm not sure I remember what the office looks like. The receptionist was very pretty. It was a beehive completely invisible from the street. There was a fancy color printer. They have Macs, not PCs. The editor wore shorts; Mary Giles wore jeans. It was over two months ago that I interviewed, with so much anxious searching in the meantime. Funny, I always knew I was a candidate--but I never expected I would get the job. I never expected this would actually happen.

Normal feels like a long, long time ago. Normal feels like something that never existed. When did I live in Brattleboro? Who was I then? What was I doing? Normal has never lasted very long, except high school, and camp, when the days were charted half-hour by half-hour.

But, Becky, you did get this job. This is happening. You got the job. You got the job. They chose you. You. Me. You. Rejoice.