zeptember

Yesterday I got in to work and my boss was already there. She told me that the new coworker and I would be getting trained on billing stuff, and that she was going to have a talk with the existing coworker. I told the boss to leave me out of it, cuz I’m gone - I’m not gonna be here in a week.

The boss took the existing coworker out to coffee, so I knew there was going to be an intense talk between them.

When the boss and the coworker got back from their meeting, they were both quiet, so I knew that the coworker had gotten in trouble. I hoped to any deity listening that the boss didn’t phrase it like I was part of this reaming, because the coworker LOVES to take shit out on me every time she gets in trouble, as though I had tattled on her.

A few minutes later, the boss called me away from my training to have a talk with me. We stayed in the office and went to the back room.

This is where reality shifted.

The boss informed me that she’d reamed the coworker, yes, as I’d suspected. BUT, she and the coworker had also talked at length about the NEW coworker, and they both decided that she’s not cutting it. She’s too slow. She doesn’t take initiative. She cannot multitask to save her life. She’s afraid to greet and phone patients and her voice is way too soft as a result. She says she went to optometry school but she doesn’t know how to dispense glasses and contact lenses, and she’s never done billing….etc etc… so the boss is going to fire her.

Just one day earlier, the boss had said she was going to KEEP the new girl despite her slowness. And I’d said GOOD cuz I still want to leave.

So now with the new girl being slated for the chopping block, the boss eyeballed me, and I stared back with wide eyes, shaking my head “no… no….”

Boss pleaded with me to stay on at least two more weeks while she tries to find someone else. She knows I have an interview on Monday with a dotcom. After we talked a bit, I sighed heavily and met her eyes. I told her for purely selfish reasons, I NEED to continue paying my bills, and despite how bad this job is to work with the existing coworker with the way she treats me, I feel I have no choice BUT to accept the boss’ begging offer.

Of course, the boss was overjoyed with this response, knowing it’s for my own selfish reasons and all that I stay. She doesn’t care, so long as she has a quick person on staff to tide her through.

And then the shower of compliments.

She told me that neither the coworker nor I _have_ to continue working things out and being nicey nice to each other. She said the fact that we are _both_ trying to get along for the sake of getting the job done each day is a testament to our own awesomeness (paraphrasing here, not her actual words).

Yeah, she’s right, too. I had to smile and pat myself on the back for that, and hoped the coworker was doing the same, cuz we’d just talked things out again recently and shook hands and promised to try to get along again.

And as sick as it all sounds, I felt the depression lifting. I do NOT want to continue to stay in this job, but knowing _I’M_ the one back in the driver seat, calling the shots for the short term - that I am the one who will quit and not be let go… that makes me feel SO much better.

When the office closed for lunch yesterday, I was the first to return with my food. The boss was still there like she always is (she never gets lunch until the last second). She walked by me and mentioned, “you know you’re getting a raise too, right?”
I looked up, surprised, and said, “No! But thank you!”

Wow, so this is what job-related fellatio feels like. Cool.

Wonder how much the raise will be.

The reality shifting didn’t stop there.

Later on, when the new coworker was with a patient, the existing coworker found me in the lab and asked if I knew that the new girl would be fired. I sighed and said yes. The existing coworker, in a quiet voice, barked out, “Quit playin’. You know Doc wants to keep you longer. How long you gonna be here?”

I turned red from being put on the spot. I turned and looked at the calendar. I told her I promised doc til the 14th of October… 21st at the very latest.

The coworker softened.

“Really, what is it about this job?”

I looked at her and replied honestly, “It’s us. You know that. We work shit out and it falls apart again. We both admitted to a personality conflict. We both admitted to liking each other but at the same time can’t work with each other.”

She nodded, and told me she’d told our boss the same thing. We talked for a bit. Turns out SHE wants me to stay on as long as I can because I really help her out so much, and she’s scared at the thought of the new girl staying on and having to train her on everything when the girl was supposed to have gone to school for all of this.

“And how do you train someone to be quick on the phones and with patients?” the existing coworker asked me. I shrugged.
She told me she was thankful that I was up on it from day one.

…

What a truly mind boggling change of events.

I realised last night that this is the climax of my lesson I’ve been meaning to learn all these past months. I dunno how to write all that out just yet, but it precluded this job by many months.

I wonder what the finish will be like.

Got in to work today, wondering if the new coworker would be fired at the start or the end of the day.

The answer is neither.

The boss wussed out on firing the new coworker, even though she screwed up yet again today. Poor woman. I really like her, too. She and I have no racial issues and no personality issues. She’s mature emotionally and she’s about twenty years my senior. She’s just slow as all hell and doesn’t appear to have the training she says she has in this field.

Despite that, I fought for her to be retained, cuz I want out so bad. I had pleaded with the boss to give the new coworker another week. And this week was it. And boss said no. Boss told me the new coworker will be let go on Tuesday.

More later in this continuing saga…

I’ve never liked my depressions. I used to go a few weeks max before another depression would set in. It got worse with george. I used to go from one depression to the next, enjoying only a mere week sometimes of happiness.

When I stopped eating sugar, wheat and yeast back in April, I noticed that I was out of the pit for long periods of time. It felt soooo good.

In June, I started to really stress about moving and the new job, and I went back to eating sugary stuff, and minimal amounts of wheat and MSG (a.k.a. yeast extract, found in all kinds of “health food”).

And of course, within a few months, here I am, meltdown.

I know WHY I’m here. I know I can get back out. But when I’ve fallen into the pit, I usually have to stay awhile and set the broken bones, so to speak. While there, I have to reflect on stuff and Wait For It as it were.
Then, the trampoline arrives and I bounce back out.

In the meantime, I become a darker than usual person.

Today’s attempt to figure my mind out centers on why I am miserable in every job I’ve ever had, and how I can stop this cycle.

Clearly I’d like to not work at all. But I’ve never wanted to be a burden on anybody. I must take care of myself. Nobody wants to have to care for someone else when they’re trying to pay their own bills, unless they’re rich of course. I grew up in poverty. I’m dating someone who is in immense debt. As of this year, I’m over $5K in debt myself.

I was taught that money buys happiness, because my mom expected my dad to provide for all of us. He is bitter and resentful because of it, and gets upset when my brother or I have to call home for a loan. So I’d stopped calling long ago…until this year. I mentioned I MIGHT have to borrow money, and his tone showed disappointment in me, so I told him forget about it, and he happily did.
I have to grow up, cut the umbilical cord, take care of myself.

When one grows up with a set way of thinking, it’s hard to break free from that. I still haven’t figured out how to break free. My friend is a constant source of inspiration to me for all the times she’s tried to quit working for the man as it were. I keep trying to pare my expenses down. I keep trying to think of new ways to reuse and to part with stuff.
But I have too much materialistic greed, so long as I live with my boyfriend, who has the means to continue living above his means. It’s not his fault that I’m weak and I cave in. But knowing I have the weakness means I should somehow remove myself from it.
If I decided to get a one bedroom shack somewhere and get rid of my CD and book collection, as well as furniture and all the spooky knick-knacks, there’s no friggin way my boyfriend would go along with that. No way.
I could do it myself right? Live on my own again, right?

I don’t feel like that’s possible, either. It’s an emotional and financial tie I’ve made.

Can’t I make changes in the existing household for just my own self?

The answer is yes, hello YES. I acknowledge that I’m weak and haven’t been able to do that, though, not while living with someone who is materialistic.
So obviously, CHANGE the reality of the situation. That’s the correct answer.

It sounds SO easy typed out like this. I’m rearin to go like I’ve been to a pep rally.

I open up the want-ads and craigslist and I start the job search - and I feel depressed and nauseated all over again. I get stuck right at the starting line. I do not have confidence in my job skills. After all the jobs I’ve had since moving to California, I know a little about a lot of stuff. But after the dotcoms came crashing down, employers put their foot down and demanded specialisation. I’ve been displaced ever since.

I tried to go back to school when I was on unemployment in 2004, but the unemployment office demanded I quit, citing I was not taking classes to further my technical skills (I was taking a UNIX class, a programming class, and a Cisco certification class).

YOU figure it out.

The bastards halted my unemployment checks until I dropped out of school. I remained unemployed until the company that let me go took me back for a new contract after ten months.

Part of my whole problem is the whoring I have to do to sell myself to corporations. It’s a slimy business to write cover letters and resumes and go through interviews. I’ve never liked it, ever.
And I’m not good at lying or faking it. And I blank on critical questions due to extreme nervousness. And I don’t get jobs as a result.

I’ve thought of applying for mental disability. But one has to prove they are mental, too, you know. One has to go through a battery of tests and one HAS to take the harmful psychological pills and one has to demonstrate they cannot hold down a job.

Well, I got the ‘can’t hold down a job’ part. The brutal truth is that I’ve been fired and fired and fired again for attitude issues - for refusing to drink the kool aid.

But I can’t prove that I’m mentally debilatated. I’m just fine when I’m not working AND have money to pay the bills.

Ahhh, there’s the ‘M’ word again.

When will I learn to stop worshipping it.

I hate this capitalistic society. I hate the immorality it teaches. I hate the shame it teaches for nonconformity.

I hate that I cannot break out of it.

I should become a buddhist monk and forsake everything and go perch on a cold mountain somewhere. That’s what would actually bring me to the next incarnation. And yet, knowing this, I shrink back in abject fear.

Why?

Why is it sooooooo difficult to let go of this carnal world?

And you thought certain drugs were bad. Hah!

Okay, it’s officially PMS, I declare it so.

My cat jumped into my lap and meowed. I began petting her and looked at her fur - there’s some grey hairs growing in. I told her she’s not supposed to age. She still acts like a kitten.

I began to reflect on the past ten years. I’ve had these cats longer than any partnered relationship I’ve ever been in. These cats moved across country with me. They’ve always been there for me - in depression, in physical pain, in joy - always there. Always unconditional love. Always ready with a purr and a soft touch on the arm or face with their paws.

I began to cry and had to go into the bathroom to sob, because I realised that I will outlive my cats… like the realisation that hits a parent who knows they will outlive their child..

At the same time, I had posted to various forums a reminder of a Cure tribute night coming up soon. This led me to check out what Cure songs I had in my iTunes. I realised I only had the Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me album in there, so I grabbed all mine and my boyfriend’s CDs and decided to import them into iTunes.

The first CD I chose was Wish - one of the albums I figured I didn’t care much for. Get that one out of the way first and all that.

I loaded the CD in and it began to play, and immediately I found myself transported back to 1994, in an ex boyfriend’s room. I’d fallen in lust with Allen in high school. He was two years younger than me, but three years behind me, class-wise, because he was in special-education classes.

He was my next-door neighbor, and he was friends with my brother. They were skateboard buddies. By my senior year of high school, my brother caught wind of Allen and I making eyes at each other, and threatened both of us. He warned us against ever hooking up. He pointed out our flaws to each other. It didn’t matter. The lust was there.

I dated some asshole who claimed my virginity right out of high school, but I broke up with him within 18 months. When I was there sobbing after the breakup, it was Allen who came over to comfort me.
It wasn’t long before we hooked up. I took his virginity.
My brother found out and beat the shit out of him.

We dated for five years. We planned to be married on September 25, 1995. His mom gave him her old engagement ring, which he presented to me on New Year’s Eve 1991.

Me staring at my engagement ring. NYE 1991.

But he started doing drugs with my brother. Back then, I was militantly against drugs, so he did this behind my back. Then he started to fall in with gangsta-whiteboy-wannabes with my brother. Then he began cheating on me with several girls.
I left him multiple times. Every time, he’d sob and beg me to take him back, and each time, I caved in. Each time, I believed he’d change, and that there’d be time to fix us before our magical wedding date - 9/25/95.

It was 1994, just over a year before our wedding, when I realised that he would never change - that he would never stop doing the drugs or cheating on me, no matter how many times I left him. I realised too that I was in love more with his looks than his personality. He’s half Native-American, complete with the olive skin and raven-black hair. The hairless chest and face. The dark brown eyes.

When I visited my mother’s house in 2004, Allen was still living in the same neighborhood and found out I was in town. He knocked on the door. When I answered and saw him standing there, my knees went weak. After all these years, the attraction held strong.
My friend was with me at the time, so I felt safe to invite Allen in for a few minutes. We caught up on the past decade. He nearly bragged about dating another girl with my name, and that he was cheating on her, too. I smiled and told him some things never change, and then told him I had to get back to packing up my childhood belongings to ship home - to my new home - in California. He said he wanted to leave Michigan too, and that I was an inspiration to him that way - that he could do it if I could. And with that, he left.

Every year on September 25th, I find myself cringing as soon as I realise what date it is. I pine for the marriage that never was. But I do not miss the person or the relationship. It’s the idea of young love and marriage at the “appropriate” age taught to our parents and handed down to us. Marriage is supposed to happen in one’s early twenties for some reason.
Well, at the same time, the generation right after my mom’s, and my generation have both changed that by getting married and having babies much later.
But it doesn’t matter. We live by what we were taught. And I was taught to graduate high school and get engaged right away. I was taught to get a full time job and then get married and have kids.
And I have failed that.

And normally I’m quite okay with that.

It’s when I get all fucking PMSing hormonal, depressed .. or I play three distinct Cure albums that this all comes flooding back: Disintegration, Wish, Seventeen Seconds. It’s all definitive of a period of intense growth and change and heartbreak in my life - during college.

GodDAMN the fucking memory associated with our senses.

I want to stop being weepy now, plz k thx. I want to overwrite certain memories associated with music too, plz.

Last night I sent out two resumes.

Tonight I tried, I really did, but I couldn’t focus long enough to send out more resumes. I got really picky and yet insecure. I tried modifying the resume again but felt ashamed.

On the way home from work, I almost cried again.
I saw a tiny girl with shoulder-length blonde hair bounding after her siblings and father, and my brain imprinted on my niece.

Tears welled up as I realised that my niece is growing up and I’m not there to see it. I began to wonder if this is a form of biological clock ticking, or if I’m just PMSing or just depressed or what.
I focused on the thought of having my own children and again, it was a blank void because of the financial situation I’m always in (read: in the red). So I know it’s not biological clock. It’s just regret in general for not being near my family.

I contemplated moving back home and quickly realised the futility in that, since unemployment is much higher there than it is here. And so naturally with that, the need for specialisation is greater there than it is here. And I have a smattering of knowledge across several fields. I’m no specialist.

I come home and drink most nights lately. Today I had fleeting suicidal thoughts.

Don’t worry though - my outlook is such that my soul will have utterly failed if I kill it off via suicide. And I don’t take kindly to failure, or of having to come back to repeat an existence (yes, I believe in reincarnation). So as depressed as I get, it goes to the point of entertaining such dark thoughts before I bounce back, out of sheer stubbornness.

I’ve not been this depressed in quite awhile. I really do have to cut sugar out of my diet again. I promised I’d do this after the last george cycle, and I failed.

Everything is so emotional for me right now, that I think it MUST be PMS.

Today, the boss asked the coworker if there was something going on between she and I that she should know about. So the coworker then pulled me aside and said once again, “Do we have a problem?”

So I told her about the gum popping yesterday. I forgot to mention the printer episode as well. We talked about our personality conflict. She kept comparing me to the girl who quit whom she misses so much, while defending herself as not actually “comparing and contrasting.” She maintained that she can do whatever the fuck she wants when the boss is not around, because that’s her only peaceful time. I told her “oh, so as your co-worker, I don’t matter then? I’m a real person too who is affected by certain things.”

She said in effect that no, I DON’T matter, that it’s only the bosslady who matters in her behaviour alterations. So I called a halt to the conversation. I asked her to please let’s just get through the next two weeks without any further bullshit between each other.

That’s when she informed me that the bosslady plans to keep me past October 7th. So I told her straight back that she and bosslady are mistaken - that I’m gone - “I’m casper” - to quote Chris Knight. I had to reassure this girl one more time that I am NOT out to take her job or the new girl’s job, that I really really mean it - I’m leaving, and so she’d better do her best to train the new girl NOW while I’m still here to give her the TIME to do it. Otherwise, she’ll keep doing the job of three people and she’ll keep being burned out.

Ah hell though. It all won’t matter in a few months, anyway, will it.
I won’t be there. That’s all that counts.

I’d rather turn to the craigslist porn ads than continue working there.

In the meantime, I’m back to fantasising that I can actually make a dime working for the local club scene and supporting my subculture. HAH. Been there, tried that, 12 years ago. Had to have two jobs minimum to survive, and that was in Michigan. Who am I kidding to try that again out here?

WTF. I’m a basket case. I’m a wreck. I just want to write and relax and live easy and buy whatever I want and need. I admit to being a lazy depressed fuck in that regard. How is it that some people can have it all while others have to scratch and claw and fight all their goddamned lives for anything? I can’t NOT believe in reincarnation for that thought alone.

I’m here to suffer. I’m not suffering as bad as others I know, dear gods hell no. But I’m here to suffer and right the previous wrongs and learn in the ways that befit my own soul’s progress. And yes, it sucks, and yes there’s always a real danger that I’ll hit the big Reset button, damn it all. But you know, that hasn’t solved my problem in the last three lives now, has it? No, it hasn’t. It’s a bad habit of mine.

And yes I’m on my third glass of wine, fuck you.

…

I live the race-class society every day of my life. I participate in capitalism and materialism. All these things I hate so much, and here I am, a full participant, with no strength and support to quit these bad habits.
The one person I do know who could help me in all of this has herself even fallen. None of us are immune. Is it better to cave than fight? Is it a less painful death that way? Why not choose the less painful option? Is that brainwashing again? Is this how religions get started - naming a right and wrong, good and evil option out of which way to go in life?

There I go being rhetorical again.

Ahhh depressions. How I didn’t miss thee.

I’m certain that once I remove sugar from the diet again, the depressions will greatly minimise if not cease again.

Today’s madness at work….

me: “(stating coworker’s name) - the gum popping, it’s disturbing my concentration.”

her: whatchoo want me to do about it?

me: could you stop?

her: NO, i CAN’T stop. they ain’t no patients in here!

me: i know. I’M trying to concentrate.

her: you can’t concentrate with the radio on…

me: ooooooooooooooookay… *rage rising*

me: really, it’s bugging me.

her: i… CAN’T… stop. i can minimize…

me: …

it’s shit like this. day after day after day, as soon as doc is out of the room or leaves for the day, as in today’s case.

…And the gum was still popping 10 mins later.

I got home from work and was ready to cry again. But crying is so messy. So I reached for a bottle of brandy.

On this job, I boil with rage constantly.

The old me, circa very early nineties, would have socked her sideways.

The new old me, circa mid 1990’s, would have gotten into a shouting match.

The new me as of today just holds it all in and it comes out in tears.

I was listening to NPR on the way home from work. The musical interlude between segments was some lonely country type tune. That nearly brought on the tears. I must really get in touch with my Appalachian roots one day. I feel a lot of healing may one day be had.

But not right now. As soon as emotion welled up, I turned off the radio and steeled myself.

Crying is so messy. And wouldn’t the coworker just LOVE to see me in tears. Fuck her, that slit. That cunt. That fuckwhore. That bitchshitter.

I asked myself what would make it all better when I got home, and I reached for the brandy and the chocolate.

On drink number two, my boyfriend convinced me to have some dinner to absorb some of the liquor. I remembered I had some leftover Chinese food, so I ate that and had my second drink.

Dessert was a glass of two-buck chuck.

I may have another.

Flashing back to work again, when the new girl was out of ear shot, I got up real close to the coworker and whispered, “It’s in your best interest to make this work.”

She replied, “who’s?”

Still staring dead at her, I said with almost a doomy voice, “yours.”

She said ‘oh, ok”, which in coworker-speak means “fuck the hell off, ho-bag”.

I walked away.

Later, as we all walked out of the office together and the new girl split off towards her car, the coworker informed me that doc plans to keep me longer than October 7th.

I said, “oh really?” and gave her a look that said, “not if I can help it,” and I told her I’m interviewing, so she’d BETTER be sure the new girl gets trained properly.

Flashing back to even earlier today:
Boss lady came in today near tears because there was so much work to do over the weekend, because the coworker had the day off on Saturday, leaving just me and the new girl. But when I left the boss on Saturday afternoon, she was all rearin to go - I told her it looked like a lot of work but really it was easy stuff, just the charges needed to be entered on a lot of it. I told her to go through the files and see. She did. She said ok - it’s manageable.

Today however, barely any of it had been done over the weekend. Bosslady even forgot to order contact lenses for a patient that’s due back in tomorrow.

So naturally I’ll get in trouble for it again somehow.

She’ll insist she gave me the file like she always does.

I’ll tell her I always keep my files on the right side of my desk that she’s given me to work on, like I always do.

And the coworker will glare at me in the meantime, and then attack me once bosslady is out of sight.

On that note, it was my fault today that the printer broke.

You know why?

I tried to load envelopes addressed to patients through the Microsoft Word tool, and the printer wouldn’t take the envelopes, and then started eating paper.

So the coworker asked in a bitter voice, “Did doc tell you to do that? We always address envelopes by hand. You don’t do that - see now the printer broke.”

I laughed and said the printer should be able to handle such a simple task - that the printer is crap.

She told me again that I should never have done it unless doctor okayed it. When I tried to have her connect to the other office printer, she refused to let me go near her machine.

I’d like to state for the record that my employment background is in TECHNICAL SUPPORT, people.

I can hook up a goddamned printer and fix a broken printer. FUCK THOSE BITCHES.

But no. I wasn’t allowed to make it all better because THEY are afraid of hardware and technology.

I did fix the broken printer by the way, and nobody thanked me.

Because, you know, it was my fault that it broke in the first place.

Fuck them.

Fuck them all.

I just cause them a big ol’ headache by screwing up constantly, don’t I.

Well.

We’ll see just how fucked they are with the new girl, who as of Saturday appears to be off the short bus, let me tell you. Learning curve has taken a dive past age 40 on that one.

After I leave, it’ll all be on the coworker again.

And wait…

WAIT

Who’s problem is it?

Not Mine.

It’s time for more wine.