I’ve embarked on a slow and lazy job hunt from the strangely privileged position of not really needing a job. I add obscure filters to my searches on Seek and write slightly-too-quirky cover letters. I’ve been taking my CV to bookshops, browsing the shelves, chatting about books, sometimes even remembering to ask for work. I’m tired of work for now.

But some days a passing sense of nostalgia drifts through me and I miss structure and connection; the way work gives one’s day, week, existence a sense of drive and purpose. Sometimes I miss extrinsic motivation, routine or feeling I’ve really earned my time off and sleep-ins through an exhaustive week of contributing to the world.

It’s likely I’ll be teaching again soon – you can take the teacher out of the institution, but you can’t… etc. And it truly is a good job: Worthy and hard. But for now I’m on hiatus. A sabbatical from usefulness. A pause from obligation. I find satisfaction in slowness and try to see like a poet again.