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Abstract

one of this seems strange: you’re supposed to hate your job. It’s normal to be paralysed by fear every Sunday. We all live for the weekends, right? Right?<h2 id="4530">Act two: you can’t pee at your desk</h2>After I’m fired. I move onto a workplace where outwardly I thrive. I’m well respected and get promoted. But by now I’ve turned inward; my insomnia and panic attacks never stop, and I’m scared to reveal too much of who I am. I hover on the margins, never becoming anyone’s friend.I start to fantasize about leaving.I picture myself sitting by an open window, typing on my laptop. A cup of coffee steams to my right-hand side. A cat snoozes on an armchair. Periodically, I pad in my socks to a pool of sunlight on the carpet where I lie down and unhurriedly charge like a solar panel. The solitude feels like a blanket around my shoulders; the silence sets me free.But this is a fantasy. I do eventually leave my full-time publishing job to become a freelance editor, but I only go half in because everyone tells me I need a “real” job. You’ll get lonely, they say. It’s important to network. You need structure. Freelancing isn’t safe.I start looking for less demanding work. I find there’s a conspicuous lack of well-paid or satisfying part-time jobs in the universe. I wonder how single mothers are supposed to support their children. I wonder how people with chronic illnesses get by.After wading through applications, feigning passion for jobs I don’t want—I adore administration, it’s so fun to be the glue that holds a company together!—I get a post in the charity sector.It’s one giant competition in being the most open to inclusivity, diversity and equality, except apparently in regard to receptionists.People waltz past every morning without a single glance, or they pop up with mundane tasks they don’t feel like doing and never thank me for taking on. People look through me in meetings. I am discouraged from staying home even when I have flu because there’s no one else to cover the front desk. I cannot pee enough, because there’s no one else to answer the door. I get so many UTIs my doctor refers me for further tests.The harder I work and the more compliant I become, the less I g

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et in return.For 2 years of blood, sweat and tears I am rewarded with a big box of chocolates. They are 2 years out of date.I take my next part-time job.<h2 id="e2cb">Act three: how’s work?</h2>One evening, at a crowded house party, a stranger asks me, “How’s work?” I tell him it’s like having someone slowly suck my soul through my belly button with a Dyson. But that’s normal, right? I say and give an awkward laugh. He looks confused. He asks me where I got the idea work was supposed to be sad and lonely. He asks if it’s maybe just the office I don’t love.I start to think about offices, to really think about them.I realise that all too often, offices are places where you can only show a meagre sliver of yourself: the part that’s efficient, competent and mild. Offices are places with cliques you have to try and wiggle your way into. Offices are places with gossip and secrets. Offices are places where gender and race equality still don’t exist.Worst of all, I realise offices are places where someone else decides for you. Your company dictates how much money your time is worth. Your manager chooses whether or not to approve your holiday. You have to drag yourself from the abyss to call her at 8 am when you have raging flu so she can decide if you’re allowed to put your health first. You have to ask her permission to go for a 10-minute walk to buy a Snickers bar.I wonder if the modern workplace is basically an extension of school, and I enjoyed that like a stubbed toe.I start to think about work too. I realise that so long as I can rest when I’m tired, eat when I’m hungry, do what I’m good at and be myself, I quite like my work as a writer and editor—maybe I even love it.It’s so curious when something that should be obvious feels like a revelation.As I type this, I sit by an open window, typing on my laptop. A cup of coffee steams by my right-hand side. A cat snoozes on an armchair. Periodically, I pad in my socks to lie in a pool of sunlight on the carpet where I unhurriedly charge like a solar panel. The solitude feels like a blanket around my shoulders. The silence sets me free. I think back to when I thought “foreword” should be spelt “forward”, and I laugh.</article></body>

How’s Work? A Tragic Comedy In 3 Acts

It’s normal to hate your job, right? Right?

Act one: in the beginning was the wrong word

When the first week of your first proper job comes to a shaking, sweating crisis by Thursday afternoon, something has gone awry.

Imagine this:

A mistake has been made on a large print-run of books. Some idiot has changed the Foreword to read Forward. It’s kind of funny, but the big boss isn’t laughing. He is instructing his staff to go through the recycling bins to find out which wet-behind-the-ears assistant editor has made the fatal mistake. When he can’t find the answer in the bins inside the office, he sends troops to the warehouse to look there.

It is like a scene from a comedy. The big boss is puce; the staff are hunched over, scrabbling on the floor; papers are flying everywhere. The big boss is going to find the person responsible, and he is going to fire them—but not before he’s publically humiliated them first.

Surprisingly, the big boss fails and life at the office moves on, but not before we’ve all learnt this is not a place you can own up to mistakes.

For me, this first panic-stricken week turns out to be an omen of things to come. This is to be the same workplace where the only other person on my team, my manager, disappears to Florida for a month without a word, leaving me to run her list of books unprepared. Where all casual conversation is forbidden and you aren’t even allowed to make a cup of tea at the same time as another member of staff.

This is to be the same workplace where I return from an emergency hospital stay to find it has been deducted from my holiday allowance. Where after I’m eventually fired because “none of the publishers wants me anymore,” I develop insomnia and night sweats.

None of this seems strange: you’re supposed to hate your job. It’s normal to be paralysed by fear every Sunday. We all live for the weekends, right? Right?

Act two: you can’t pee at your desk

After I’m fired. I move onto a workplace where outwardly I thrive. I’m well respected and get promoted. But by now I’ve turned inward; my insomnia and panic attacks never stop, and I’m scared to reveal too much of who I am. I hover on the margins, never becoming anyone’s friend.

I start to fantasize about leaving.

I picture myself sitting by an open window, typing on my laptop. A cup of coffee steams to my right-hand side. A cat snoozes on an armchair. Periodically, I pad in my socks to a pool of sunlight on the carpet where I lie down and unhurriedly charge like a solar panel. The solitude feels like a blanket around my shoulders; the silence sets me free.

But this is a fantasy. I do eventually leave my full-time publishing job to become a freelance editor, but I only go half in because everyone tells me I need a “real” job. You’ll get lonely, they say. It’s important to network. You need structure. Freelancing isn’t safe.

I start looking for less demanding work. I find there’s a conspicuous lack of well-paid or satisfying part-time jobs in the universe. I wonder how single mothers are supposed to support their children. I wonder how people with chronic illnesses get by.

After wading through applications, feigning passion for jobs I don’t want—I adore administration, it’s so fun to be the glue that holds a company together!—I get a post in the charity sector.

It’s one giant competition in being the most open to inclusivity, diversity and equality, except apparently in regard to receptionists.

People waltz past every morning without a single glance, or they pop up with mundane tasks they don’t feel like doing and never thank me for taking on. People look through me in meetings. I am discouraged from staying home even when I have flu because there’s no one else to cover the front desk. I cannot pee enough, because there’s no one else to answer the door. I get so many UTIs my doctor refers me for further tests.

The harder I work and the more compliant I become, the less I get in return.

For 2 years of blood, sweat and tears I am rewarded with a big box of chocolates. They are 2 years out of date.

I take my next part-time job.

Act three: how’s work?

One evening, at a crowded house party, a stranger asks me, “How’s work?” I tell him it’s like having someone slowly suck my soul through my belly button with a Dyson. But that’s normal, right? I say and give an awkward laugh. He looks confused. He asks me where I got the idea work was supposed to be sad and lonely. He asks if it’s maybe just the office I don’t love.

I start to think about offices, to really think about them.

I realise that all too often, offices are places where you can only show a meagre sliver of yourself: the part that’s efficient, competent and mild. Offices are places with cliques you have to try and wiggle your way into. Offices are places with gossip and secrets. Offices are places where gender and race equality still don’t exist.

Worst of all, I realise offices are places where someone else decides for you. Your company dictates how much money your time is worth. Your manager chooses whether or not to approve your holiday. You have to drag yourself from the abyss to call her at 8 am when you have raging flu so she can decide if you’re allowed to put your health first. You have to ask her permission to go for a 10-minute walk to buy a Snickers bar.

I wonder if the modern workplace is basically an extension of school, and I enjoyed that like a stubbed toe.

I start to think about work too. I realise that so long as I can rest when I’m tired, eat when I’m hungry, do what I’m good at and be myself, I quite like my work as a writer and editor—maybe I even love it.

It’s so curious when something that should be obvious feels like a revelation.

As I type this, I sit by an open window, typing on my laptop. A cup of coffee steams by my right-hand side. A cat snoozes on an armchair. Periodically, I pad in my socks to lie in a pool of sunlight on the carpet where I unhurriedly charge like a solar panel. The solitude feels like a blanket around my shoulders. The silence sets me free. I think back to when I thought “foreword” should be spelt “forward”, and I laugh.