My last post reminds me of the joke where the horse walks into a bar and the bartender asks, “Why the long face?”
Sorry if I bummed everybody out. Really, I’m good. In fact, after getting some of that out of my head and into the ether, I’m feeling…hopeful.
I’ve already saved a word doc with three paragraphs that make up the start of an essay I’ve been wanting to write for years.
Finally, I have started again.
I haven’t written an essay in months. And months. I used to turn in 750-words every week to my editor who would feed them through the syndication loop; within days, I’d have emails showing up in my inbox from as far north as Niagara Falls. Before I had my column, I had a blog. I blogged every day for a year and then kept blogging for three more years. I blogged enough to make friends with other writer/bloggers from all over, writer-friends who are now simply friends. Friends who I take flights to visit.
I quit my column, and I deleted that blog. I wanted to write something else.
And so, finally, I’ve started again.
I’m still not looking forward to work tomorrow morning.
I know. I thought so too…that there would be some magical door swing open to all the things I want right in my life as soon as I faced the shit I was so cared to write for so long. I’d wake up and there would be an offer for a fulfilling position that wouldn’t feel like work at all (but still comes with all the benefits, salary, and vacation time as the jobs that do). I’d be thinner and my hair wouldn’t be three different colors starting with the gray roots.
Maybe next week.
What magic door are you waiting to swing open?
But you’ve started. And if life is to be fulfilling it is because we push, not because it is handed to us. As so many people say, watch kids at a park. They aren’t for the most part frolicking. They are fucking serious about their play. Those games have real rules. It’s like watching master chess players at work.
We are going to do what brings us joy and the rest will follow. You will write that essay. You will go to work. None of it will be easy, but many times you will laugh. Many times you will cry.
The reason I took that job I was offered? I went in and met a head, HEAD dude (he was my seventh interview?) and he looked at me with a smile and in a Georgia accent said, “Look if we didn’t have to work none of us would. Let’s start off by knowing that. However, I want the people that come to work here to like it well enough and to like the people they work with. I want people to have a laugh and I want to give them anything they need to do their job the best they can. No, we’d rather not work but let’s make it through the best we can. Because anyone who says they’d rather be working is full of shit. I’d never hire an asshole like that.”
He had me at hello.
Love.
i love that too.
and i could love my job, if only they would let me do it what they told me they wanted me to do vs. busy, busy work. another day, another post. i’m not going to bitch about it now. (i may later.)
at least nothing has happened here that ranks on the crazy scale like my former place of employment and the inspiration for, “This Ain’t Working, a memoir on work.” Right now, of the 14 people who work there, 13 are dreading tomorrow morning b/c they’ll have to show up and pretend that everything is normal and that the 14th employee maybe doesn’t have criminal charges against him for sending his ex hostile and threatening text messages (he does, though). he’s also the employee that has a file in his personal record for a sexual harassment conflict AND a week unpaid for physically confronting a fellow colleague. (i always wondered what it would take to get fired from there…)
the cops showed up looking for him the friday after my last day. the ceo was on his 6th week of vacation in two months and couldn’t be reached. the problem employee had been MIA the entire time the CEO was out. Both the CEO and he finally returned. He made up a story and the CEO played along; the CEO’s most defining leadership strength being his ability to ignore the fact that his place of business is a complete mad house.
see–there’s an essay.
I want to meet that guy! He sounds fantastic.
of course, the madman’s a published author. it’s true. it fucking kills me, but still true none the less.
Lyra–don’t suppose y’all need a corporate librarian? ‘Cause I could totally do that in a company like yous.
I’ll keep my ears open!
My magic door would come with the sort of clarity one needs to walk through it definitively and not half-assedly or backwards. I always wanted to be the sort of person who was 100% convinced of an action before taking it. Do you have a door like that somewhere?
I applaud your fresh start, Josie. I feel the energy from here.
(if any of us were 100 percent sure of action, pre-action, i don’t think much would get done.)
i know what you mean. i have a magnet on my fridge that reads “You always know.” and i believe it, that on whatever level, we know. it’s a matter of accessing those levels. i don’t think it happens til we’re dead though.
I’m a bit tall and fat for my magic door, it’s a squeeze and my ass is stuck in the jamb. The good news is I will eventually shed enough padding to push my way through. Entering my 49th year I am finally realizing that my heart is good and deserving, and the fear and shame and anger – especially the uncanny ability of martyrdom – are just wrapping I can throw away like old candy papers. I’m a firm believer there’s a whole world on the other side of that door.
we are not fat–we are well rounded and well heeled and have a lifetime of physical attributes to prove it. that being said, i know that fucking feeling of not fitting through a magic door (for me, it’s last year’s jeans–ARGH!!!)
a good friend of mine once told me, “as soon as i start feeling sorry for myself, i know my martyr is in charge and i make her move to the back of the bus.”
i try my best to practice this to help alleviate my own martyr-ish shit, cause i got a lot, but it usually only works after i have soothed myself w/ ice cream thus the not fitting through the door!
Sound advice!
My magic door is labeled “Perfect Parenting.”
I have a feeling it’s a fake door glued to a solid wall, but that doesn’t keep me from yanking on the handle.
First, three cheers for beginning the essay! Or make that 33 cheers.
I am attempting to force my way through one particular magic door right now. It’s not the first time I’ve tried this door, and it’s slammed shut on me several times in the past. I honestly don’t know if I need to just try another door or stick it out with this one.
You’ve got momentum on your side. Keep going.
I’d all but given up on magic doors and otherwise and then something fell on me. Literally.
I keep knocking on that publishing door, but it remains firmly shut. Knock, knock, knock. It’s getting old and my knuckles hurt. What a waste of time. Writing is so much more fun than trying to get published.
So glad for you, my dear. It is amazing how our words can brighten our spirits, how good it feels when they come out in a pleasing way, because, let’s face it, some days they don’t.
As Lisa said, now you get to keep going!