Confession

Okay, the truth. I really hate my job. Or, I guess to be perfectly fair, I really hate many aspects of my job lately. For the past week, almost all I've done, aside from a few phone calls and running some flyers to different sites, is fold brochures. That's right. Fold brochures. Hundreds of them. Yes, I make copies of the brochures and then they sit in a big stack in front of me and I fold each one twice so it is brochure shaped. Hundreds of times I do this. I folded brochures for the packets we sent to pediatricians offices. I folded brochures for all the school presentations I schedule but don't go to. I folded brochures for the packets for our funders and new interns. All week long, the bulk of my working time was spent folding brochures.

Also, I bundled cards. I took stacks of our little information cards with our name and contact info on them, and I counted them out into stacks of 10. And then I bundled the stacks of 10 into stacks of 30. And then I took the stacks of 30 and rubber banded them and put them back in the box. Okay, it is very important that we know how many cards we're handing out because it's supposed to be roughly representational of how many people learn about the program and it's something we keep track of for our national program as well as for grants. So we need to know, when we hand a teacher a stack of cards that we have given her 30, so we can go back to the office and enter it into the database. Still. I spend a great deal of time stacking cards.
And during all this, I watched lots of TV. Let's face it, it does not take all of my brain power to fold a brochure. So I watched The Daily Show and the unfolding drama with Jim Cramer. I watched The Office. I watched Castle. I watched the Simpsons. I watched 30 Rock. I watched shows I have never even been interested in before because I was out of shows to watch and I was still folding brochures and bundling cards.

Also phone calls. I spend a lot of time making phone calls to folks like volunteers who don't call me back. I spend lots of time making phone calls to schools to set up presentations that I will not be presenting at.

It dawned on me a while ago that I have become a secretary. An administrative assistant if you will. And when, summer before last when I did my last temping assignment and I was inscribing on a scroll with my own blood the words, "I will never temp again!!!!", I'm not sure if I bothered to also inscribe the vow into the eternal annals of the blogosphere, but let me assure you, there were vows made, and tribal dances done around sacred fires, all to say that I never wanted to temp again!!! And now, I realize that I have become an administrative assistant. Maybe one rung higher than an administrative assistant. Because I do occasionally do somewhat cool things like go to tabling events and administrate websites and do site trainings. But, like I said, mostly lately, brochures and cards. Damn. This...makes me hate my life. Just a little. But, hatred.

Never mind the larger questions of "Why the hell am I wasting my time doing this shit when I have an advanced degree that cost thousands of dollars, not to mention the fact that this organization contracted with the government on the terms that I would build capacity for this organization, not just do busy work!?!?!?" No, lay those aside and focus on the day to day: "Hey! This shit is boring! I am so bored! Why, sweet Jesus, has it come to this?!?!" And perhaps the even more fundamental question: "I am out of TV shows!!! What will I do now!!! What else is there that will occupy my mind but keep my hands free so I can fold more fucking brochures!?!?!"

The truth is that I’ve never actually had a job that I enjoyed. Not even remotely. Generally I think I cope by just pretending that the situation is not what it actually is and going home and trying to forget that I have any sort of job at all. And a large part of me believes that it has to be that way, that that’s what work IS and if you actually enjoyed it, it wouldn’t be your job it would be your hobby. After all, nobody actually enjoys their job, right? At least not anyone I know. But then the other large part of me rebels utterly against this idea. I just can’t look forward to spending the rest of my life waking up in the morning, hating what I’m going to spend the bulk of that day doing. Can’t do it. Won’t do it. Don’t try to make me or I’ll bite you. Seriously. I don’t care if I’m poor and have nowhere to live and live on food stamps for the rest of my life. Being able to do something meaningful with my life is definitely number two on my list of things S. needs to be happy and function and I’m not going to let it go, elusive as it may currently seem.

Sigh. Only three and a half more months to go. But, seriously, if you can recommend any other shows that are good and available on Hulu, that would be awesome. Because desperate times...well, you know.

S.

(And yes, for the record, the Chinese lanterns don't actually have anything to do with anything, I just liked the picture.)