When one door closes....
Thursday, May. 06, 2021 3:56 PM

“Every day the clock resets. Your wins don't matter. Your failures don't matter. Don't stress on what was, fight for what could be.“ - Sean Higgins

What do you say when you haven't posted in over a year? Do you pick up right where you left off, or do you summarize, as best as possible, everything that has taken place since the last time you logged in? I suppose I could do a little bit of both.

To make a long story as short as possible: I went to work for Magdalen, leaving behind the comfort of S.S. and all the wonderful people there. They had hired me on as the office manager of the school, but under no circumstances, was I allowed to actually manage the office. I asked them for a job description, and it took the principal over 8 months to get me one. By the time she provided me with one, it was for some other school and completely didn't apply towards what I was expected to do job wise. Of course, when I mentioned this, it just pissed her off.

Either I'm really good at pissing people off, or there is something terribly wrong with the school administration and the secretary. The first thing the principal did that affected me was not allow me to work over the Christmas break. I hadn't worked at the school for the allotted 90 days yet to start accruing vacation time, so this really hurt me financially. Between finding out that there were a lot of unpaid days off at this job and that I would not be making the promised amount that I was guaranteed (In fact, I'd be making 5k less in the long run), I was extremely upset at my dad for pushing me to take the job. I would have made the same amount of money working part time at S.S., which is ridiculous. I ended up updating all of their programs, which hadn't been updated since 2016 - and even that pissed the principal off.

There were so many games being played. The environment was terribly toxic. I didn't like the fact that they called themselves Christians but were acting like gossiping middle school children. I absolutely hated being micromanaged and treated like a child by the principal AND the school secretary. I was told I was not a team player because I wouldn't partake in putting down children or their families. As soon as they started to badmouth a student or a student's parent, I tried to tune it out and do actual work.

Within six months time, they started to take responsibilities away from me. I knew then that they were trying to get me to quit. Believe me, I would have loved to have quit but I was in this for the long haul for two of my nieces. I read some articles about the top signs your boss wants you to quit, and every single one of them applied to my situation. My parents believe that my confidence and intelligence scared them, so they considered me a threat. I probably also kept giving them "the look," which didn't help matters. The look is where you accidentally let somebody know that you think what they're doing is completely stupid.

Anyhow, by the time December rolled around and I was on probation for things I didn't do but couldn't prove that I didn't do them, they found their excuse to get rid of me. The principal had the audacity to say that I should have stayed at S.S., that I did not belong in a school environment (which is odd since the students and faculty loved me - and they really hate her), that if I didn't resign they'd force me to quit (I'm not the only one she has said these words too), and then she held her hand up high and said she was up here, held her other hand way down low and said I was down there. When I didn't burst into tears like most people that come out of her office, she was taken aback. She said, "you seem relieved to be going. Why?" My sister Angie said I should have said, "because you're a bitch." What I ended up saying was something along the lines of, "We both know that I'm overqualified for this job. It doesn't stimulate me and it doesn't pay enough. You don't trust me as much as I don't trust you. I appreciate being given the opportunity to work here. I will really miss the students and faculty."

I'm leaving out a lot of stuff that they did to me over the year and a half that I worked there. I'm also not going to reiterate the things I witnessed them saying and doing to others. Rehashing it all would just piss me off. I brought all of it up to the priest of the parish. Whether he's done something about it is beyond me, but I feel good that I at least said something. Sure, it may have blackballed me from ever working in the diocese again, but after my experience there, I'm not even sure I want to associate with Catholicism anymore. They really turned me off from the religion I grew up with.

So, here I am now, going on 5 months of unemployment. No, I'm not drawing unemployment. I'm not even sure I can since they forced me to "willingly" resign. I have applied for a few jobs, but I seem to have entered into a midlife crisis of sorts. Part of me knows I need to just get a job to pay the bills, while another part of me is putting it off because I really don't want to experience drama in the workforce again. From what I understand, it's everywhere. Where are the people who just want to come in, do their work, and maybe chat about little things like what they want to do over the weekend? Why must I always find myself working in a place where people are catty and petty?

Anyhow, I went back to school in October of last year to get a certificate in data analytics. This has kept me busy during the last 5 months. I'll be done with the certificate program this coming October. Hopefully this will open up some doors for future employment. I've learned everything from Tableau to Python. It's been quite interesting. I hope I'm doing the right thing because its costing me lots of money.

What else is new? I binge watched the entire series of South Park on HBO. I finally broke up with cable and downgraded to having just the internet. I'm on Obamacare, which is, ironically, the best health care I've ever been on. My best friend Aaron broke up with me because of our mutual depression. I've been seeing a therapist through Zoom for the last year, and I absolutely love it. I have dark days, but I have mostly good days. I just got through a few dark days. It's very hard being unemployed. You feel like you have no purpose. People say, "then get a job!" Easier said than done, People! I've applied for jobs and haven't heard back, or they've already filled the position. Sure, I could probably go to a McDonald's and get hired on right away - or maybe not. I may be too qualified to be a burger flipper, or not qualified enough. You never know.

On the bright side, I finally developed enough of a backbone to say, "Hey, this is my life! I get to make the choices on where I end up from here on out." It's been extremely liberating, and a long time coming.

I could go on and on, but I think I'll save some of my random thoughts for another post. It's not like much is happening here. I just know that I am full of anger and restlessness, which worries me because I'm also depressed. I just hope I get to the acceptance stage soon because I know it's not good for me to be isolating myself. I'm trying not to push myself too much. I know that everything that's meant to happen will happen in it's own time. I just need to practice patience and believe the saying that I keep hearing all the time, "when one door closes, another one opens."