The meaning of my life

It seems that ever since i got back home i haven't felt right. I mean my body is slowly getting better after the massacre it took in Southeast Asia and Taiwan but my mind just hasn't been right. Part of it was coming back to Australia under the circumstances we did and a case of reverse culture shock, part of it was a loss of independence being back home (though my parents have been giving me a lot of room to move) but there was something else i couldn't put my finger on about why i'm in a slump.

Yesterday in bed i figured it out.

I found being overseas my life meant something. I may not have been saving the world from landmines or finding the cure for cancer but i was teaching and i did make a difference in some peoples lives during my time "away." I instantly knew thats why i feel like Melbourne is no more than a place to hide from the world because that's what i did in Melbourne. I didn't feel like i had any freedom to go out and explore. I know some may say "well you can explore Melbourne anytime" but that's not the point. The point i'm trying to make is that when i was overseas i felt momentum growing in my life. Even though i may not have been the worlds greatest teacher i enjoyed watching my kids learn and have fun and that i was responsible for that. I loved it when the class laughed when i did something silly and i loved the relationships i had with my friends overseas.

Does my life mean anything in Melbourne now? At this stage no. I'm still job searching and i'm frustrated that the process is so automated these days. Example...today i was in the city and last night i saw casual jobs for ushers at the Victorian Arts Centre. I've always enjoyed the Arts Centre though i'm the first to admit i'm not a "patron of the arts" perse`. I thought this would be a great second job to extra cash to keep me going whilst being at home. So i walked to the centre and climbed the stairs to administration only to be told that "You have to fill out the online application form" I was so pissed off that here i was standing in front of a guy in a nice suit just wanting to drop my resume in and he wouldn't accept it.

My faith in Melbourne seems to be diminishing rather rapidly and i am slipping back into a routine where i was before i left. I know i've grown and i don't want to do a lot of growing in Melbourne for a long long time. I just want to go to work, come home and do other bits and peices. I'm a very confused person right now. My life in Melbourne seems to have no direction. I was making a difference by the emails that i used to send to everyone that i know. Though to me my emails were updates about what's going on to people back at home, they supposidly made a lot of people happy so when i came back i got a lot of questions about why i stopped them (i transferred to Blogger) and are they coming back. Well if that's the only way i've made a difference overseas then in the time i want to be here, how can i make a difference at home whereby everyones eyes are on me and there is no distance between people and my actions?

I'm just a little confused about my place in the world today.