the crushing weight of personal expectation

At what point do you accept that you aren't going to be special?

When do you acknowledge that the world will not tremble at your passing?

How do you accept that you're just another face in an insignificant mass?

I don't have answers for this, anymore than I had answers to the nihilistic despair that hit me in my twenties (eventually I realised that 'it is what it is' and that freed me - it took a while though to just let go). Do other people have these same conceits as they grow up? I'm not sure it's any different to the hordes of 18 year olds raised on a diet of celebrity that assume that desire equals realisation. I'm not even sure of what it is I'm feeling like I've missed.

It would help if I had an idea of what I was supposed to *be* - but I have no clue, just a sense of not meeting some expectations that I can't even vocalise into a coherent form. Currently I'm putting it down to winter blues and some frustrations about work that are just colouring everything else.

Maybe it's a midlife crisis ;)

Bah.

'Expect the unexpected'

On my drive to work this morning, the digital sign on Pont Champlain said 'Expect the unexpected. Drive carefully'. What the hell does that mean? I'm all for illogical sentences ('where did you lose it?'), but on a street sign I expect a little more. It's the equivalent of those road signs warning you that deer might cross at some point, or rocks might fall on you - how am I supposed to process that in a useful manner?

Expect the unexpected and drive accordingly - if we really followed that advice then we'd all be doing 5mph and have mattresses strapped to all available surfaces of the car. And be wearing a helmet. Scratch that, we'd probably just stay home with the tinfoil hats on, ordering out for food that we wouldn't dare open the door for.

Why isn't 'don't drive like a dick' sufficient? Everyone would get that and behave themselves - why the need for nannying statements that make you want to do the unexpected just to fuck with everyone else. 'Hah - I did a handbrake turn while pulling a mooney out the window. You crashed into the barriers because you weren't expecting that'. I'm not sure it would hold up in court, but still....