Being Dragged, Kicking and Screaming
To the next level of joy
When I got fired from my job cleaning residents’ rooms at Eliza Jennings Assisted Care Facility I was incredulous.
They were firing ME?
The residents loved me. I kept their rooms clean and took the time to hang out and chat with them. I cared about them. I liked spending time with them. I don’t know who cried harder that day: me or Mrs. Matheson.
However, my work hours were 6 am to 3 pm.
Not 6:10am to 3:10pm.
Or 6:23am to 3:23pm.
I got warned verbally. I got written up. But in my mind, it didn’t matter that I’d roll in ten to fifteen minutes late once a week or so as long as I stayed those ten to fifteen minutes later at the end of the day. Either way, they got their eight hours out of me, right? I still remember deciding to stop and grab an espresso on my way to work that last morning knowing full well I’d be five minutes late. But, come on, five minutes? Please. The director of the facility was firm. I’d been warned.
Years later I had the opportunity to thank that woman for firing me.
I’d have never quit that job. I’d still be there, cleaning old people’s rooms for minimum wage and thinking I was doing ok living with a junkie in Cleveland Ohio instead of living in Manhattan with a writer and artist who treats me better than anyone ever has. And I owe it all to that woman who did me the great good favor of dragging me, kicking and screaming to the next level of joy. I didn’t know that’s what was happening at the time.
But now I do.
After losing the job at Eliza Jennings I found myself hanging out at a little poster art kiosk in the Terminal Tower in downtown Cleveland, chatting with the guy that worked there. The company was hiring. Did I want to sell Ansel Adams and Georgia O’Keefe posters for $8 an hour, 30 hours a week?
Me? Sell posters? Sell anything? Not me; I couldn’t.
But then I did.
Not only did I support myself through my own contributions for nearly two years but I also became very determined not to stay in retail. And that’s how I wound up starting college at the age of 40 having zero ideas what I wanted to study. 40 years old and just beginning to consider what I wanted to do when I grew up.
And now, unemployed again, having finished up my little 18-month stint at the Most Fantastic Job That Went Away, I wonder if I’m again being dragged, kicking and screaming to something far better; something I’d never have had the nerve to strike out for on my own.
I really never would have quit this job!
The pay was great and the benefits were top of the line. I had 22 paid vacation days a year, 3 personal days, paid sick time off and my own office with a door that closed. And a space heater. And work that I could do by myself without having to deal with any office politics.
But about the work.
Once I’d mastered the learning curve the job got pretty damned tedious. Same old thing, day in and day out. I was never going to grow in that position; it was never going to lead to greater responsibilities or challenges. And, yet, I’d still be there if the gods hadn’t decided I needed to move my ass along.
I’m sending out resumes but I’m also contemplating other ways to keep the wolves from the door (thanks, my fellow Medium writers, you’ve given me some great ideas). I’ve had several enjoyable interviews but no one’s sent any job offers yet.
And, speaking of the next level of joy, for now I am absolutely wallowing in delight at all this glorious time I have to write and hang out with friends and trek around the city with my partner and watch movies and go to the gym and finally pot that rubber tree cutting and read and sleep in and resume my on-again-off-again sitting practice and go to the theater and write some more. I guess I’m back in the hallway and trying doorknobs.
The gods know what they’re dealing with here: a bull-headed, practical woman who never ever again wants to have to choose between having the power shut off or sending the rent in late because there’s not enough money. That fear paralyzes me; freezes me into place at whatever job I land in and yet here I am in free fall again with no job and next to no savings.
I can either seize up in terror and get dragged or I can stretch out my wings and glide to that next level of joy.
Either way……….here goes!
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