Jobs and Whores
And what they have in common
This is my eye candy for today. Kaiserin Fredrich rose. I'm swimming with words tonight. I am pretty sure I have become the most lost and ill fitting person. I think it may be time to get arrested in a brand new red Porsche for picking up a prostitute. Because I've tried almost everything else. I'm not good at much. I heard my fortune told when I was very small, over and over again, how I wouldn't ever find success because I'm too undisciplined, not smart enough, and as though that wasn't crime enough I'm a god-damned bleeding heart liberal. I'll never be good at business, my fortune teller accused me, because I'm too soft.
I feel pretty hard right now. The fortune teller turned out to be correct. Trying to get a job is the best way to find out how much you suck as a person and to find out how much more education everyone else has, how much more experience they have, and how good they are at writing resumes. It's a demoralizing business to know how perfect you would be at a job and then not even get an interview over and over again. I am only at the beginning of it. I saw Philip go through it for a year. I understand better why he was so deeply depressed all that time.
Trying to write a tantalizing resume is like a whore trying on the tightest shortest skirt and wondering if she should go with the leather cutouts or the see-thru lace? Should she go for that MAC lip gloss that makes her look like she's got wet voltage for lips or go with something like dark velvet smoke? What will shimmer and attract the most prospects? It feels dirty. Come and get my nectar...I'm really good at followingorders directions...
It's got me wondering what the hell I'm doing. I'm too tired to really hike the skirt up for job prospects. I'm too tired to prove myself. I've never gotten the dream job without selling my soul first. Why should it be different for me now that I'm older, fatter, and apparently just as unqualified as ever?
I keep trying to make my blog into some recognizable success. Maybe if I get enough traffic I could make enough money to stay home? People do it all the time. I have a very smart and helpful friend who keeps giving me the recipe over and over again on how to get more traffic. She tells me everything I need to know. I've followed some of her advice and thanks to her I have been enjoying taking photos more than ever before and they are improving in quality all the time. But there is a wall between me and taking the steps to do what people do to get more traffic. Single topic? Yeah, I do that really well. Don't lure people in with pretty crafts and then shock the crap out of them with deflating posts like this one. Eye Candy!! Optimism! Focus!!
It is thanks to her that I got an opportunity to fund much of my trip to Scotland by doing some technical writing.
It's easy to get sucked into the desire for a high traffic blog. I've been looking at writing jobs and all the professional blogger ones want (obviously) a writer who has already written for high traffic blogs and knows how to play the search engines like a high rolling gambler in a Vegas casino. I can say that I have some very loyal readers but the most I've ever had in a day is too embarrassing to report.
Everyone wants what I haven't got.
Now I'm afraid to go to JoAnn's Fabrics to ask for an application because it's the one job I have been certain I could get. Why should I be so sure? What makes me so special that I should automatically qualify for a minimum wage sales job in a fabric shop? I'm terrified to find out that I can't even qualify for a job there. The place it all began. My professional life. Fabric store sales clerk. I was hopeful then that that's not all I would achieve.
I'm going to pick up an application tomorrow.
I'm crashing fast. This is American life. In case anyone was curious to know, I spent $20,000 dollars to get an associates degree in Fashion Design so that I could end up jobless and penniless at forty. All the extraneous things in my life are going to have to be shed. Hopes, passions, community service. I will have no spirit left for anyone but myself and my family. I won't have time to give to others. I think about all the commitments I've made and I feel regret.
I think I can't breath.
I'm peeling off a layer right here. I don't care if I get traffic on this blog or not. I can't keep trying so hard at everything. It hurts too much. I'm full up with disappointments in myself. I don't need one more thing to make me feel like a loser. I don't care if anyone comes here. This is my club. My secret fort. I will eat cheese and I will tell the truth even if it drives every last person away. I almost always feel alone anyway.
There is no air left.
I suppose better days are ahead. That's what everyone likes to say. I'm not so sure. I kind of think this might be it. I had a tarot reading once that said I would never get rich or famous. I would possibly have just enough, maybe even an adequate living, but I would never lead a couture life.
I'm going to go watch as many episodes of CSI as I can before I fall asleep sitting up with a beer in my hand and don't bother telling me that this isn't the answer to my problems. Of course it's not. But until the answer presents itself in very clear language I am going to do what I can to salvage my very tenuous grasp on my sanity.
Here are a few things I'm thankful for:
See, I'm still capable of seeing the bright side. I just need to put an end to this prolonged (just about three years now) period of extreme stress. It's really worn down my kid, my husband, and me. I can work a sales job like the rest of this country, be glad my hand hasn't been pulverized in a blender, and live out the rest of my life just working the forty and losing my teeth like the rest of America.
Life reminds me of reading Steinbeck novels. That is why I stopped reading Steinbeck.
I feel pretty hard right now. The fortune teller turned out to be correct. Trying to get a job is the best way to find out how much you suck as a person and to find out how much more education everyone else has, how much more experience they have, and how good they are at writing resumes. It's a demoralizing business to know how perfect you would be at a job and then not even get an interview over and over again. I am only at the beginning of it. I saw Philip go through it for a year. I understand better why he was so deeply depressed all that time.
Trying to write a tantalizing resume is like a whore trying on the tightest shortest skirt and wondering if she should go with the leather cutouts or the see-thru lace? Should she go for that MAC lip gloss that makes her look like she's got wet voltage for lips or go with something like dark velvet smoke? What will shimmer and attract the most prospects? It feels dirty. Come and get my nectar...I'm really good at following
It's got me wondering what the hell I'm doing. I'm too tired to really hike the skirt up for job prospects. I'm too tired to prove myself. I've never gotten the dream job without selling my soul first. Why should it be different for me now that I'm older, fatter, and apparently just as unqualified as ever?
I keep trying to make my blog into some recognizable success. Maybe if I get enough traffic I could make enough money to stay home? People do it all the time. I have a very smart and helpful friend who keeps giving me the recipe over and over again on how to get more traffic. She tells me everything I need to know. I've followed some of her advice and thanks to her I have been enjoying taking photos more than ever before and they are improving in quality all the time. But there is a wall between me and taking the steps to do what people do to get more traffic. Single topic? Yeah, I do that really well. Don't lure people in with pretty crafts and then shock the crap out of them with deflating posts like this one. Eye Candy!! Optimism! Focus!!
It is thanks to her that I got an opportunity to fund much of my trip to Scotland by doing some technical writing.
It's easy to get sucked into the desire for a high traffic blog. I've been looking at writing jobs and all the professional blogger ones want (obviously) a writer who has already written for high traffic blogs and knows how to play the search engines like a high rolling gambler in a Vegas casino. I can say that I have some very loyal readers but the most I've ever had in a day is too embarrassing to report.
Everyone wants what I haven't got.
Now I'm afraid to go to JoAnn's Fabrics to ask for an application because it's the one job I have been certain I could get. Why should I be so sure? What makes me so special that I should automatically qualify for a minimum wage sales job in a fabric shop? I'm terrified to find out that I can't even qualify for a job there. The place it all began. My professional life. Fabric store sales clerk. I was hopeful then that that's not all I would achieve.
I'm going to pick up an application tomorrow.
I'm crashing fast. This is American life. In case anyone was curious to know, I spent $20,000 dollars to get an associates degree in Fashion Design so that I could end up jobless and penniless at forty. All the extraneous things in my life are going to have to be shed. Hopes, passions, community service. I will have no spirit left for anyone but myself and my family. I won't have time to give to others. I think about all the commitments I've made and I feel regret.
I think I can't breath.
I'm peeling off a layer right here. I don't care if I get traffic on this blog or not. I can't keep trying so hard at everything. It hurts too much. I'm full up with disappointments in myself. I don't need one more thing to make me feel like a loser. I don't care if anyone comes here. This is my club. My secret fort. I will eat cheese and I will tell the truth even if it drives every last person away. I almost always feel alone anyway.
There is no air left.
I suppose better days are ahead. That's what everyone likes to say. I'm not so sure. I kind of think this might be it. I had a tarot reading once that said I would never get rich or famous. I would possibly have just enough, maybe even an adequate living, but I would never lead a couture life.
I'm going to go watch as many episodes of CSI as I can before I fall asleep sitting up with a beer in my hand and don't bother telling me that this isn't the answer to my problems. Of course it's not. But until the answer presents itself in very clear language I am going to do what I can to salvage my very tenuous grasp on my sanity.
Here are a few things I'm thankful for:
- That I'm not missing all my limbs from a freak accident with a weed whacker.
- That lettuce is in season and available to me again.
- That I'm not dying of cancer, yet.
- That I haven't stuck my hand in my food processor.
- That my friend Chelsea is still my friend and seems able to put up with my crazy.
- That Sid and Dennis will always sit down to dinner with us.
- That Philip is learning to brew beer.
- That George Bush Jr. will be out of office in seven months.
- That my old rose "Kaiserin Fredrich" is so beautiful.
- That I don't have a bladder infection right now.
See, I'm still capable of seeing the bright side. I just need to put an end to this prolonged (just about three years now) period of extreme stress. It's really worn down my kid, my husband, and me. I can work a sales job like the rest of this country, be glad my hand hasn't been pulverized in a blender, and live out the rest of my life just working the forty and losing my teeth like the rest of America.
Life reminds me of reading Steinbeck novels. That is why I stopped reading Steinbeck.
Labels: American Dream, chaotic life, job search, joblessness