I tried and I failed.
Well, maybe I didn’t fail. More of a “hasty withdrawal” is really what happened.
I left a job two months ago because I was moving too far away to keep it and not be paying $300 in gas every week. I had outgrown it anyways, but it was the first time I took a chance and left a job before securing a new one.
I dug into my savings account and moped around on Craigslist’s job boards until I got a call for an interview. I interviewed, I got the job, I started. The first few days were overwhelming, but good. I was tired and happy. But then I started to become a little more tired and a little less happy. And then I was just tired. The company, the people-all great. It was sitting in my cubicle for eight hours that I realized I didn’t care about what I was doing. I saw myself from outside my body, only I was Peter Gibbons and I was a few sleeps away from gutting a fish on my desk.
Call it quarter-life crisis. Call it just seeing more clearly. Either way, I had to get out.
The day I gave my notice, I sat in the parking lot and tried to cry. I felt sick and couldn’t wash away the lump in my throat with any amount of bottled iced tea (and I thought Sweet Leaf iced tea with the nana on the front could cure EVERYTHING).
I took the legal pad I was given on the first day and wrote the most heartfelt resignation letter I have ever written. I’ve broken up with my gym before via letter (per their requirements) and it was much less a Dear John letter than it was an 8th grader dumping her best friend over the fact that the elliptical was always broken (what?).
I folded it and put in my bag and walked into the building. While waiting for the elevator, I found a lucky penny. I went up my office level, got off the elevator, and went straight to the bathroom. I sat on the toilet and looked at my phone for a couple minutes. I should have never come, I should have just not shown up.
The pressure was getting to me. I could tell that if someone was good at reading a stranger’s emotions, they’d look at me, ask if I was okay, and I would immediately crumble.
Thankfully, I went to my manager’s office, closed the door, and sputtered Office Space quotes, fidgeted, and became glassy-eyed. He responded like the nice camp counselor you liked would. I felt relieved, went on with my day. I went to lunch and checked my phone. Maya Angelou had died and my news feed was cluttered with her quotes. My first reaction was to wonder about how Oprah was taking all this. Then I started to think about if this was some sort of weird synchronicity, that I was taking a chance and pretending to be fearless. I checked my email after reading all the Maya Angelou quotes. Two months ago I had emailed someone about a job. They hadn’t responded, so I let well enough alone and moved on. I now had a sweet email sitting in my inbox offering any help with my job search. Another weird synchronicity. Was everything falling into place or falling apart?
Now, I’m sitting 40 tabs deep into my job search with a calm that didn’t exist the first time around. Still drinking a bottled ice tea, staring at a Reiki charged candle I’ve been saving for two years. You know, for a special occasion. It’s called “Laughter” and comes with a mantra to recite when you light it (as mentioned in the previous post). I lit it today but when I have to think “happy thoughts” I immediately start thinking about the world exploding and massive blood shed. I blew the candle out. Then I worried that if snuffing the candle meant that all those things would come true. I forced some happy thoughts and lit the candle again without the mantra. I think it should be okay.
Anyways, back to the job search, but this time I hope the job comes searching for me. In the mean time, I’ll be visiting Colorado next week with my family, so I hope I have some sort of weird vision-quest type experience so I can figure my shit out.
ciao nanas <3
