What the hell am I doing with my life?

That "Wear Sunscreen" song has a line that goes like this:

I'm going on 31 in September, and those words are both comforting and terrifying. I have felt so conflicted for so long about what I should be doing with this life of mine. I am persuaded that this is the only life I get, so I should be making the most of it, making the most difference I can, leaving the world a better place than I found it, etc. But how?

I feel the unfortunate, American tendency to get my piece of the pie and hunker down. I could have done it too. Learning has always come easy to me: whether it be physics, history, graduate liberal arts, philosophy, or whatever. I'm fortunate in so many ways. Most of my friends studied engineering of some flavor and are making a cool six figures. I could have done that too (after all, I helped most of them with their physics homework in college!). But I didn't do that. I go back and forth between kicking myself and trying to convince myself that I couldn't have survived the corporate world: spending my days designing something which has the sole purpose of paying higher dividends to company stockholders; nothing seems more empty. But simultaneously, my current carrier—teaching high school physics—pays me a whopping $3,200 a month after taxes, pension, etc. Now, don't get me wrong, we are getting by, but I'm not growing any nest egg. We are scrapping the barrel at the end of every month, and we don't spend money on much else besides decent, non-poisoned, non-environment-destroying food at the grocery store. Am I making a difference in the lives of my students? Maybe a few of them. I remember fondly the great teachers of my life, and a large part of who I am I owe to them. But maybe I affect one or two in a substantial way. Maybe I'm just a kind adult, a male role model for kids whose father has left town, or someone who believes in them when the rest of the world seems to have given up. Is that enough to count my life well lived? Maybe.

But these are my choices? Give of my self, my time, my possible salary in order to maybe affect a few people a year? I have other talents: I'm not a terrible writer, I'm mostly a clear thinker, I can explain difficult concepts, I can critique a position, I understand math, blah blah blah. Could I use these talents to have a greater impact elsewhere? I think about the science writing masters degree at MIT a lot. I could be a journalist or a science correspondent, spending my time writing words to educate the general public about this or that. I could be an author, explaining how knowledge, science, and history all work, allowing people to better articulate their positions on religion, politics, nature, and anything in between. Would that be a life well lived?

One of my professors at FSU, a man who was my main mentor and for whom I have a great respect, told me that I needed to get out of FSU and get into the Ivy Leagues. He said I operated at a different caliber. Do I believe that? I'd like to. But then what am I doing teaching high school in Kyle, Texas?

Agata and I have general plans to move back to Florida eventually, but to Jacksonville this time, to start an urban farming cooperative with some close friends of ours. We want to live in and build a community like the kind we think might end up saving this old earth from ourselves. Would that be a life well lived?

Could I be happy in the classroom for the rest of my career? My gut says no. But maybe I wouldn't be happy if I wasn't in the trenches. I could see myself being miserable in a posh, well paying job, no matter how intellectually satisfying it might be; I see myself withering away, trying to add one, ridiculously pointless iota to humanity's body of knowledge, all to sell myself to the publishers and justify my fancy desk with a fancy view of my fancy campus. But my family would be taken care of: I'd have my retirement account, my worry-free automatic bill payments, no more "Oh shit! Do I have that set to get paid today?"

Bah.

Marx was right: our labor is what sustains us; our bodies continue to breathe and our hearts continue to beat because of the work we do. Our lives are literally made of what we do with them. The true tragedy of capitalism, he thought, is that we are forced to sell our most precious resource: ourselves. But capitalism forces us to choose: do I give myself to this old world, maybe changing a life or two, but scraping by, leaving my family with nothing when I die, always the victim of credit card interest, having no one to vote for but this or that paid-for politician, or do I sell my soul to the highest bidder, offering my services to increase stock prices, ramp up climate change, promote planned obsolescence, waste, and greed, sanctifying manipulation and exploitation? A false dichotomy perhaps. I could have been the engineer which solved sustainable fusion or designed a 98% efficient solar cell; making the system work for us instead of against us, finally cancelling out the inevitable contradictions of capitalism.

In the end, all I know is that I don't know. Perhaps I'll always feel somewhat useless in this complex world. The forces of history march on: no one is in control and no one knows what to do. What difference can one man really make? So now we are back where we started: what the hell should I be doing with my life?