Some days, you just know....Usually, for me, it's a Wednesday, though. The kind of day where you wake up with a groan and later realize it was prophetic rather than just a reflection of how you felt at the time. It seems somehow inevitable and comical after it happens, when you stumble into your apartment after an 11-hour workday, toting a couple small bags of groceries to hold you over till you get a chance to do some real grocery shopping, throw some laundry in so something's clean tomorrow, heat up some soup, pour yourself a glass of OJ, and finally collapse. Congratulations, you made it.

Through this round, that is. Prepare yourself for the next one, tomorrow.

The Pro-Con List Has Spoken.

The decision: to stay in my current position as a community organizer/canvasser/field manager (meaning not only do I do the work, but I teach other people how also), or to take a job a friend offered? It came down to an essential conflict:

work I believe in, and a possible/likely promotion in a couple months

vs.

fewer hours and better, more stable pay -- allowing me time and energy for artistic and literary pursuits I've been neglecting

Neither is a career for me in and of itself; both positions are a means to an end. So, it's come down to a matter of priorities, of what I value more. The first, I'm sure, would look better on a resumé, but then, so would the expanded portfolio of work from the second. The second would also allow me the luxury of relative solitude, though the work itself wouldn't be as interesting. Granted, I've never had a problem keeping myself entertained.

As I thought and jotted down more pros and cons, the more I found myself putting time-related things on the "Pro" side for this new job; my current work -- well, it's nonprofit work, long hours with lots of energy put in. There is no way to reduce these hours and keep the position, since I'm not in school presently. I've realized that at this point in my life, time is very important to me. I live alone and have no responsibilities to a spouse, children, or even a pet; at what other time in my life will I be more primed to reduce my time commitment to work and keep my expenses low for the sake of making art?

I won't bore you with the other factors; what I gave you was the crux of it. The decision is made -- I made the decision: I am quitting my job, a job I always appreciate and often love; I am quitting it to buy myself some time (and energy), to reinvest in the things that I love more, things that I've been letting slide in the past nine months of this work. And, wonder of wonders in this economy, I am quitting it to take another job.

Wish me luck.

so you can hear it...

I jotted down a few lines this afternoon and threw down a quick recording, primarily so you could hear the new amp in action. It's nothing spectacular, not a great recording, not even a full song, but it's really about the enthusiasm -- how much I'm loving this tone (commonsense and uncomplicated -- an American Strat through a Fender tube amp). The lyrics you're hearing follow.

little wooden man on the bookshelf
he stands and waits, 'cause he can't move himself
he reminds me of you
frozen in time, the way you were, too

little wooden man on the bookshelf
he makes excuses 'cause he can't move himself
he reminds me of you
makin' excuses the way you used to

Happy 4th of July, America.... (12 minutes belated, apologies...)

I thought this week would be easier than this... and hell, it's only just turning Wednesday

Monday, the Man Who Is Away was in an accident. He wasn’t hurt, but it was a serious accident. He was pretty shaken by it, though he had calmed greatly by the time I saw him after work (an almost unheard-of occurrence with our current schedules and the fact that he's usually away - hence, the moniker). The woman who caused it was flying down the wrong side of the highway, and she was taken to the hospital by helicopter.

This week, I am also "on review" at work, which I've been told is a training tool rather than a way to fire us. However, the fact is also that if I don't raise a certain amount by the end of this week, I'm out. I persevered after a rough start Monday night, and did pretty well. Tonight, though... well, tonight threw a monkey wrench the size of Gibraltar in the whole thing. Tonight was the lowest night, fundraising-wise, that I can recall… ever. Since I started this job. It was atrocious. It was embarrassing. It introduced a deficit I've got two days to make up. And in the past few weeks, I’ve had more low nights similar to (but not quite as bad as) this one – more of them, so close together, than in the eight months I’ve been doing this work. And, since my pay is based solely on my fundraising, real injury is added to insult.

There is more to my present state of mind, state of contempating quitting and seizing an opportunity a friend has offered, even if I make up that deficit in the next couple of days. There are months and months of fifty-plus-hour weeks; of long, tough days where I struggled and realized that, for all my hard work, I had made less than minimum wage for that day; of not talking to the Man Who Is Away for several days at a time because of our opposite schedules and both of our long days; of sitting on curbsides, trying not to cry (or crying) from the stress of my job, from having more than my fill of people feeding me apathy, excuses, bullshit, and flat-out lies (on the positive side, I've learned how to tell when strangers are lying to me, for the most part) -- and being ready to throw up from disgust at it. (And, what can I say, sometimes jerks are drawn to one another by some invisible force.) Of course, there are also the positive things, but largely, I've gained the skills I wished to develop through this -- I did months ago, really... perhaps it is time to move on....

So, here is the picture of where I've been tonight, cooking dinner late and eating late, mentally crinkling (not quite crunching) a few numbers to the crackle of chicken frying, thinking I could make it work, this other job. Another something completely different to add to my ever-diversifying list of jobs; I feel a little like Jack London in considering it. But my current work was never something I intended to make a career of, either. The potential new job would be only part-time for now, but could become full time in a couple months, and even so, it would be just enough to cover necessities. Something about how horrible the people were tonight also makes working alone on a deserted campus sound wonderful. Give me ghosts; I'm getting weary of the living.

Currently Transatlanticism By Death Cab for Cutie "The Sound of Settling" see related

Something's off, like brandy in my coffee. Sloppy metaphors and half-formed thoughts.

I do not handle disappointment well. I have known this about myself for some time.

Cue angsty music, change into comfortable and unattractive clothes; the day is over.

I thought you understood it, too.

If time is like a house we would share, then I have spent days sitting on the steps, in the yard, frustrated and disappointed and wondering why you're the only one with a key to the doors, why I have been turned out to allow others entrance for an afternoon. Because it's such a tiny house, there's barely room for another person in there. It's a compounding factor, this fact that we're already trying to fit two grown people into a hobbit hole. Some things are bound to be knocked off of shelves and broken. But, today, for instance -- we had plans! Today, it ought to have been me in the house. Or outside of it, wherever we decided to go. Unfair is... how a southern wind whisks through and nudges you; how you can't say no to it, despite protests you'd rather have kept our commitment; how I can't say no to it, as it's already decided. Later, when you profess your disappointment, I absolve you. You identify us as victims of our conflicting schedules; I validate your position as you validated mine. I hear your reasons. Doesn't need to be a big deal. And yet... to my heart, you stood me up. You are the captain of your fate, as you have said to me. Guess there's been a mutiny. Instead, we indict Miscommunication -- it was clear, you say you thought, and I insist to you that it was not at all clear. Clarity would have left me free. Free to paint a mural on the space I'd left blank for you today.

When a woman says she's fine, she means it; but what she doesn't say is it's an acronym: Freaked out, Insecure, Neurotic, and Emotional.

When it's already too late, I submit a final, meek request, tempered with understanding. I am good at being understanding. I don't want to be, but it's ingrained. Your "no" is appropriately meek in response. But, a "no" nonetheless. I try to imagine a world in which you would hear the overjustification in my numerous utterings of "it's okay" and just show up. Instead, I resign myself to feeling crappy for the rest of the crappy night following what didn't at all resemble the day I had been eagerly anticipating in order to get myself through a crappy week, knowing that eventually (soon) I'll get over it. Ah, well; add another to the tally of times you have left me hanging. Play a drinking game to it. Write a song about it. Whatever. In the meantime, I declare war on the phrase, "Let's play it by ear."