Giving Thanks

‘Tis the week to be grateful for what you have.  To acknowledge that your bounty is full, in spite of sometimes gloomy circumstances.  To recognize not just how much worse things could be but genuinely how good the actually are.

It was with great frustration on Tuesday that I made my fourth visit to the unemployment office.  The purpose of my visit was to respond to a letter I had received informing me that I was not enrolled in their ‘job services’ program and failure to do so would result in termination of my benefits.  While standing in line I couldn’t help but to be completely struck by the guy in front of me line.  Sometimes you have moments in life that shake you and jerk you back into reality.  That happened on Tuesday while standing in line and it was that moment that was the precipitous for this post.

The guy in front of me in line was there with his wife and 3 kids.  They were all dirty.  And when I say dirty, I mean filthy.  The youngest of the children was in a stroller and I found myself fixated on the condition of the stroller.  It was probably originally a navy blue color, but the dirt on the stroller made it seem like a light brown shade.  I just kept staring at the stroller and thought and was genuinely perplexed on how it got to be so dirty.  Maybe they drive a truck and keep it in the bed and that’s how, I wondered.  Then my thoughts went to, how would you go about cleaning a stroller?  Do you hose it down?  Then I thought, I would just buy a new one if I had a stroller that dirty.  Forget trying to hose it off.  Even right now, sans job, that would be my first reaction – chuck it in the garbage and buy a new one.  I can’t have my child riding around in some filthy stroller.  They seemed like a nice family though.  The Dad, who was in line, was comforting the child sitting in the filth laden stroller with the sweestest Dad voice.  The Mom was sitting in a nearby chair with the middle child on her lap, stroking her hair, the child looked like she was sick.  It left me grateful that I’m not tackling this unemployment stint with a family of mouths to feed.  It made me even more grateful for the constant security blanket that is always in the back of my mind – there’s a warm bed and a fridge full of food over at my parents house whenever I need it.  I’m enabled by my parents really.  Without them I know that I wouldn’t be as cavalier as I sometimes am about turning down jobs that don’t suit me or don’t pay enough.  I’m enabled to do that, because I know I’ll never starve.  My clothes will never be dirty.  It is because of that advantage that I have in life that I wanted to buy this kid a new stroller.  I wanted to offer to pay for their thanksgiving dinner.  Hell, what I really wanted to do was just tell the unemployment lady to start depositing my money into his account.  Then, he got up to the window and the lady was helping him complete his form and she said “were you laid off or did you quit?”  He responded “I quit.”  Unbelievable.  Under what circumstances would you quit your job when you have a wife and three children in filthy clothes?  Nonetheless, I realized how incredibly grateful I am that I’m not in his shoes.  Despite what his reasons are for whatever it is that he’s doing.  I don’t have 4 mouths to feed.  I don’t have a family in dirty clothes.  It’s just me and Tucker and 2 parents who are 15 minutes down the road who are ready, willing and able to help me in any way they can.  For that, I am eternally grateful.

Apologies are only offered on Wednesdays. Sorry for the inconvenience.

In reflection of yesterday’s post, I got to thinking that its quite possible that I could have offended some folks.  People who are Administrative Assistants or people who have been in the same shoes I’m in and took a job like that, knowing that they’re much more qualified.  Here’s the thing, the purpose of this blog is to say what I think when I think it.  Sometimes, it might not suit the masses.  Don’t take any of it personally, what I think today may not remain my opinion tomorrow.  But today, it is what it is.  If I didn’t have this blog, I would still have all of these thoughts, I just wouldn’t have a forum to express them in a way that forces me to lace my thoughts with humor.  And, frankly, if I didn’t take a moment here and there to lace these thoughts with humor it would turn into an ugly situation rather quickly.

In the meantime, take this blog at face value: a blog, written by some totally unimportant young gal sitting on her couch in a living room in West Virginia.  If you like it, great.  If you don’t, then you’ll find that there is a red box with an X in it in the top right hand corner of your screen.  But I hope you’ll stick around – there’s lots of good times to be had and humor to be laced through the craptasticness of it all.

The correct term is Administrative Assistant

If I'm super lucky, maybe this could be me!

The other day an acquaintance of mine sends me a job posting and suggests I apply. 

The title: Legal Secretary.   

#1: I’m gonna guess, just a wild guess here, that this position comes fully equipped with a greater than 50% paycut for me. 

#2:  I used to have a secretary and now I might actually have the opportunity to be one.  This gets better every day!  The only difference is that I didn’t call my secretary a secretary, because that term went out the political correctness window about 15 years ago.  They’re called Administrative Assistants now.  As the new secretary, I would, of course, tackle the title change as my first order of business.

#3: For a few years now I have tossed around the idea of going back to school to become… yep, you guessed it: an attorney.  I know I could do it, its just a matter of whether or not I really want to go back, full time into the college world at 28 and take on tens of thousands of dollars in debt to do so.  So, let me just be the first to tell you that WAY before I ever, ever took the toll on my ego to become a secretary for one, I will just bite the bullet and be one.

Best.Quote.Ever

I will tell you that there is one thing that is golden to someone who is unemployed.  It’s better than the unemployment office actually getting your deposit correct, its better than the formatting on your resume actually doing what you want it to do, its better than a free lunch… its talking to another person who is going or has recently gone through exactly what you are.  Someone who truly ‘gets it’

My friend M left the working world a couple of years ago in order to pursue his Masters degree full time, when he finished his degree the employers didn’t exactly bang down his front door – he spent many ‘a months, Masters degree in hand, looking for work.  He and I chatted for awhile the other night and I was sharing my sob story about how I found out I didn’t get the job I really wanted, and how more than anything it was just a major blow to my ego. 

His response: “While I was unemployed, I applied to over 500 jobs – my ego packed its bags about 9 months ago”

Priceless!  I found myself giggling about his response at random intervals all day yesterday.  It made me feel like, its not only normal, but totally ok to feel like you have been pushed as far as humanly possible into the bottom of the barrel.  I’ll recover.  So, go ahead ego – pack your bags… you’ll be back.

NO, Miss Julie you absolutely cannot have that coat. Put that credit card away right this instant young lady!

I miss shopping. 

This coat is calling me.  In fact, I’m fairly certain that Mr. Kenneth Cole himself must have researched me, specifically, when designing this coat as it fits like a glove.  I could probably rationalize the need for it – I mean, winter is just around the corner and I do need to stay warm.  It is currently 50% off. 

That’s also how I rationalized those boots a few months back and a recent decision to go on a ski trip, 2 ski trips, actually.  The rationalization must stop somewhere.  It ends here.  I will stand firm and NOT purchase this coat.  I can do it.  I know I can. 

We’ll see…

A look back at Month 1

I think unemployment has sucked the creative writing juices right outta me.  Ever since my last day, I just haven’t felt like writing.  I haven’t felt like I had anything good to write about.  In reality, I have had plenty of interesting things to write about, but for some reason the words just aren’t coming.

In short, month 1 has been a roller coaster.  I spent the first two weeks essentially taking a break – I visited some friends, got a few chores done that had been on the backburner for months, if not years.  Then, slowly but surely, I settled into a routine of job searching, working on school work for my masters degree program and volunteering.  I’ve had moments where I thought the right thing is just around the corner, then moments where I looked back at where my career was a couple of short years ago and wonder how I fell this far.  There have been days where I’ve thought that this is actually kind of fun – you know, getting to work out whenever you want, being able to prepare lunch rather than brown bag it, or taking a day to just chill and watch TV all.day.long.  But I’ve had my share of days where I thought it simply isn’t possible for my ego to be bruised any further, all the while knowing that the next blow is probably right around the corner.  I’ve learned that routine is the key to my sanity and that self pity is inevitable, but needs to be kept in check.  I’m trying to learn to find a way to enjoy this break.  In the meantime, I’m going to force myself to start writing regularly again.   So, be prepared for some less than stellar posts.   But I think writing about my troubles will save me from drowning in them.  We’ll see.

Outplacement Services Lady

Awhile back, I posted about how my former company enlisted an outplacement services agency to assist all of the axed employees in looking for a job.  I hadn’t contacted her for a meeting yet since I had quite a few job leads that I was working on and felt something would come together and meeting with her would be a waste of my time.  Since pretty much every single last one of those leads has dissolved, I thought I might as well go see what she could do to help me out.

Funny thing about which outplacement services agency my company chose to use.  The whole reason I lost my job was because my company relocated to Pittsburgh.  So, if you were going to hire an agency to assist people who live in the state of West Virginia to find another job, one might assume you would choose an agency in West Virginia – you know, one that might actually have contacts here.  Well, if you assumed that, you would be incorrect my friends.  My former company chose an agency in Pittsbugh.  Man, they really must not like this state or any of the people in it. 

As you can imagine, my meeting was less than productive.  Essentially, she knows no one.  Which, for someone who’s sole job is to help generate leads for me and pass my resume on to companies which are hiring really makes her pretty useless.  She did, however let me know that she would get me a key to her local office and I could come in any time I wanted to use computers and that the fridge is stocked with water.  I guess if I find myself homeless then that could come in handy. 

Although it was a pretty unsuccessful meeting, I can now cross “ensure that you have explored every last possible opportunity” off of my job searching to-do list.

I’m in need of a new tank top… or at a minimum, a shower

I talked to my friend D yesterday afternoon and he said, “I still read your blog every day – its great.”  I responded, “well, I haven’t really been blogging lately, it seems like the anticipation of losing my job was way more interesting than my life after I lost it.”  Then I launched into this story about how I realized that afternoon that I had been wearing the same tank top for 3 days (which, in hindsight, I realized is technically false - it was 4 days) and how I decided yesterday morning not to take a shower because I was taking a class at the gym at 6:30 PM and thought “what’s the point?”  Anyway, I concluded to D that these details just didn’t seem worthy of a blog, I mean who wants to read about the demise of an otherwise successful, smart woman into the girl that wears the same tank top for 4 days and doesn’t shower?

Then, I thought… probably a lot of people – because that’s hilarious!  I mean, what other self respecting 28 year old woman wears the same tank top for 4 days (I’ll add that I also wore it to bed… so it was on a 24 hour cycle) and then decides that it is worthless to shower because 10 hours from now I’ll get sweaty.  I’ll add one more point  – yesterday morning, after I took the dog for a walk and settled into my job searching routine, I realized that beyond the not showering, beyond the same tank top circa 72 hours of wear, I also did not even come close to matching.   I had on, and continued to wear for the duration of the day, purple running pants, the iconic grey tank top, a green fleece and pink socks.  This, I thought, would be the day that I get a package delivered from some unbelievably hot UPS man.  That would be my luck.

You’ll be glad to know I showered upon returning from the gym last night, the grey tank top has been expired to the laundry basket and today my friends I am actually making an effort to match.  Hey, its the little things.

Unemployment Office – Round 2

On Saturday I received a letter from the unemployment office which contained my initial claim form with a few rather large red circles indicating errors that I must correct and return to the unemployment office “No later than November 2nd”.

In my 2.5 weeks of being unemployed my sense of what day of the week it is continues to decline - so you can imagine that if I don’t know if its Monday or Thursday it would be correct to also assume that I have absolutely no clue what calendar day it is.  Therefore, on Monday (November 2nd) as I was organizing which errands to run when – I decided the most efficient thing to do would be to stop by the unemployment office to drop off the corrected form on Tuesday when I would be in that part of town running other errands.

Tuesday morning, as I was brushing my teeth I had the ephiphany that Monday was November 2nd, not Tuesday as I had originally thought.  CRAP.

So, off to the unemployment office I went, calculating a formidable lie in my head on my way there.  My lie was that I was out of town and didn’t receive the letter until late Monday.  The guy bought it and changed the date in his little stamper to read “November 2nd” -  sweet.  That was easy enough.  

While the unemployment guy was busy changing his stamper date, I noticed the guy behind me flagrantly leaning over my shoulder to read my form.  Completely irritated, I started to swing around and give him my two cents on giving someone a little privacy when it occured to me that I was at the unemployment office – not necessarily a place known for the highest members of society and perhaps my 5′0″, 115 pound frame self ought to just keep her scrappy little mouth shut.

Hopefully this will be my last round with the unemployment folks.  I have wondered though, if the folks at the unemployment office who make this process so time consuming and difficult have ever thought to themselves – hey, maybe if we made this a little simpler these people could spend their time looking for jobs instead of standing around in here trying to get their money.  Yeah, probably not.

SWF Seeking JOB

Every job I have applied to, I had to disclose my gender, ethnicity and race.  Doesn’t this seem just a tad intrusive?  Not to mention, counter productive – if you’re “Equal Opportunity” then what does it matter what color I am? 

I recently thought I had a decent job of landing a PR job – only the day that I was supposed to hear about whether or not I got an interview, instead I got an Equal Opportunity form in the mail for me to complete and return.  I did so and soon thereafter learned I didn’t get an interview.  It leaves me without closure – did I not get the job because I’m not qualified?  Or did I not get the job because I’m white and female?  Or just because I’m white?  Or just because I’m female?  Too many variables.  How is a girl supposed to know what to improve upon if she can’t figure out why she’s not getting jobs.  It would be a shame to continue to waste time applying for PR jobs if I knew that everyone would view me as unqualified.  But perhaps, it wasn’t my qualifications at all – perhaps it was my gender, boring ethnicity or pale face?  See, if I knew those details it would help.  I could turn the tables and start calling people and saying “excuse me are you currently looking for any White Females for your staff?  Oh you are!  Great, I assume no need to forward my resume because qualifications are really sooo unimportant… right?”