Realize deeply that the present moment is all you ever have.
- Eckhart Tolle
i've changed my mind. i don't want to run...not really. i want to stay this time. i want to go THROUGH it...live this, just as it is, right NOW.
when i said i wanted to just run, i was talking about work. therapy. my life. the mixture.
notice that i don't talk about work here...there's a reason for that, most days. it's not been going as grandly as i've put on sometimes. i usually don't want to get into it online. i don't know why, i just don't. let's just say that, well, alice has fallen through the looking glass...
i've got a pregnant unmarried morman woman thinking that i live in sin. i've got a republican fangirl who collects presidential paper dolls (the one with ronald reagan in his tighty whities? that one needs to NEVER be seen again. yikes.) i have the bosslady who promised help and understanding, and has delivered impatience and sarcasm. morman girl (technically the person directly above me) is crazy and apparently thinks i'm a moron, judging by the condescending way she speaks to me. her boyfriend is gross and lecherous. our students are hit or miss...there's a few very cool people, there's a 18 yr old drama mama who i deal with okay most days, and then there are S & P. p is also a mormon. that's how he got that job (not my words). he stares at me like he hates me and he wants me, and he doesn't know what is happening. he's a young thing, and by his own admission looks like chucky from child's play. s is just...evil. sure she's 21 and already married (no kids), churchgoing (met her husband there), sings in the choir...but you should hear that mouth. you know, the one she prays with? jesus. she's a gossip. a very mean one. you can see it in her eyes. wrong turn somewhere.
i can't count things anymore. apparently this is either a side effect of medicine or a symptom of anxiety and panic in general. i work in a college bookstore. you can see how this isn't good. i've been training on closing the bookstore, and i fuck up the register drawer each and every time i touch it. i've put numbers in backwards, in different formations. i'll be counting, and just forget what number i was on. even out loud. i have to fight so so hard for any focus or concentration, and even then, it's not enough to do the job. i've learned all the steps to closing and all the other jobs i do. i just can't do anything requiring counting without messing it up and panicking.
some of y'all have worked with me before. what the hell? at every job, i'm sure i've been stressed. having anxiety attacks. complete breakdowns. but i could count to ten, by god. that's the thing that will push me out the door. I CANNOT DO WHAT THEY HIRED ME TO DO. i also can't work tuesdays (group days) anymore. i need three days a week, and no drawer counting. put me on the bookfloor, with occasional register time. otherwise? just not a good idea.
but let's talk about the pride that holds me there...that voice that never stops telling me to push harder. i CAN'T push any harder. i'm on the highest octane, the highest performance level i HAVE. i can't do it all. i have no friends at work. not really. there are no jjs or beths or gretchens this time around. no one to roll my eyes with. no one to tell me that i'm not the crazy one. it is SO HARD to deal it all in solitude. the not-so-subtle message is that without ever coming out, i am just not like them. i'm weird. i don't belong. that would be acceptable to me (cause god knows i've been there before) if they weren't so...bitchy about it.
they want me to do what i'm training to do. that's the way it always is. i can accept that. that's work, yes? it's just that i CAN'T. it's not their fault. but to tell me that i'm not learning fast enough on my first time doing it? it's just not working and i'm stressed out completely trying to push harder, learn faster, etc. can't get blood from a turnip. i just don't have it and no amount of pushing (from them or from myself) is going to make that happen. something has simply got to give.
i've been talking to j. we're working on a plan a, a plan b, a plan c if we need to. plan a is that i stay as long as i can. i talk to the bosslady honestly and tell her that for reasons beyond my control, i can't do some of the things she hired me to do. she can meet me halfway and offer more training, less workplace pressure or even just take those things off of my list of responsibilities. or she can fire me. that's secretly what i've been waiting for. then i can get unemployment. then i tried my best and it wasn't enough but i can still pay my bills, and hey, i didn't quit! it all comes down to that conversation. she's not going to like what i have to say. it always sucks when you're the first person to call a bad situation. we don't have a holiday rush, but we do have a spring semester rush. it adds up to something like 60 hours a week for two to three weeks. i'm BARELY surviving 25. i don't know how i'm going to make it. and i think she needs to know that now.
i want out of the pressure cooker that i've been living in. i don't necessarily want out of the job as a whole...just the job as it is. i don't know how far that can bend. that's not my decision. either she can work with me as i am right now, or she can't. either is valid. either is fair. all i know is that if i keep going like i'm going, i'll be in catawba hospital with a thorazine drip by new years.
and right now all i can say is that i'm so damn tired of living this in my head. anybody been here? anyone have any advice? ideas? something i'm not seeing? i need feedback in a bad bad way. please. here or at hothead@diaryland.com. thanks y'all....
and hell yes, happy friday. :)
*
"Back when we started
We didn't know how hard it was
Living on nothing
But what the wind would bring to us
Now we've got something
I can imagine fighting for
So why is fighting all that we're good at anymore
And sometimes I don't have the energy
To prove everybody wrong
And I try my best to be strong
But you know it's so hard
It's so hard
It's so hard when it doesn't come easy
It's so hard when it doesn't come fast
It's so hard when it doesn't come easy
It's so hard
It felt like a given
Something a woman's born to do
A natural ambition
To see a reflection of me and you
And I'd feel so guilty
If that was a gift I couldn't give
And could you be happy
If life wasn't how we pictured it
And sometimes I just want to wait it out
To prove everybody wrong
And I need your help to move on
Cause you know it's so hard
It's so hard
It's so hard when it doesn't come easy
It's so hard when it doesn't come fast
It's so hard when it doesn't come easy
So hard
I can live for the moment
When all these clouds open up for me to see
And show me a vision
Of you and me swimming peacefully
Last night you told me
That you can't remember
How to feel free..."