Heather Havrilesky on a bigger life

It’s hard to write about your core self, that doesn’t always want to honor other people’s wishes and is rarely satisfied. But you have to make some space for that core self, and sing about it, because when it is satisfied, that’s the most satisfaction you ever get to feel. That’s the satisfaction that makes you rhapsodize without worrying about how stupid you sound. That’s the satisfaction that makes you drive all the way to San Jose and back, wasting your whole day, listening to stories that make you realize that the life you’ve led up until then has been very, very small. And all at once, in that car speeding across miles of farmland — empty paper cups, open sky, cigarette smoke drifting out of each window into the cold air — you know you want a bigger life than the one you’ve been living. Drive, by Heather Havrilesky