i have a procrastination problem. this isn't a surprise - i'd say almost everyone i know suffers from procrastination-related disorders - but in a post-college world, i find myself putting off deadlines and aspirations further and futher. and further. and then some more. i always procrastinated in college, but my goody-two-shoes complex never allowed me to turn a paper in late for fear of a reproachful glance from a beloved professor or the possibility of points deducted. the structure and inherent formulas of college - as slack as they may have been, in hindsight - forced me to make sure i got stuff done, whether it be an english paper or making sure i was in shape in time for spring break.

done with uva, i did basically the only thing i was supposed to do after graduation - i got a job and a place to live. after i came back from a year in italy, the job and the house where obtained in little over a month, simply because i was so focused on attaining that expected goal. i made job and house-hunting my life; i dedicated all hours of the day to pouring through the classifieds and perfecting my resume. and, to a certain extent, it paid off. i found a decently-paying job that's related to my field of interest, and i'm renting a cute house in arlington with my friends.

so the obvious question is: now what?

god, i hate that question.

i'm not even really sure why i need to address it. i'm pretty happy. my job - well, it could be worse. i go out in the city, i've got a great boyfriend, i've got enough money to buy booze, go shopping and take the occasional vacation. why do i need to already been thinking about the next step when i haven't even been living or working here for more than eight months?

but in any case, the question is there, and it's not going away.

so now the procrastination comes into play. i've got this question, this desire to do something else, to achieve another goal, and that's all well and good.

however. i have no fucking clue of how to go about it all. this lack of structure, a complete lack of motivation, other than "wanting to do something else", is really actually a frickin huge hindrance. grad school is the obvious next step, but i'm kind of afraid of doing that, because honestly, i feel pretty sure that it would just be a way of reinserting myself into a structured environment where professors and administrators can tell me what i need to be doing in order to be successful. plus, there's the whole issue of me not having any clue what i would want to study. italian? journalism? education? literature? cooking? eh? anyway, i can't even get myself to study seriously for the GREs. i've bought, like, six different books, and have studied on and off for months. people ask me, so, when are you taking the GREs? and all i can do is shrugh and say, sometime before the summer?

i'm telling you, i'm having a hard time not just dropping everything and moving back to italy and working illegaly as a bartender at some godawful 'english pub' in florence where the only customers are obnoxious study-abroad kids, convinced that they are living out the italian lifestyle because they are drinking guinness with other americans in a bar that happens to be next to the duomo.

anyway, all i really want is for some magical inspiration to hit me to tell me what this mythical next step should be. dream or drug-induced hallucination or sign from god, anything's good with me. is that really too much to ask for?