Reading harold_maude's journal

The last three days are done. I had them off but a series of cirumstansces made it impossible to relax.

It started Sunday, with my manager telling me that if they needed extra hands they would be giving me a call.
It has been a long month and there have been frustrations at every turn, and the thought of having 4 days all together without having to think about work, or anything related to work was like getting a mini vacation.

Something I desperately needed to unwind and actually be able to relax.

Something told me that when he said that, somewhere in the next three days I was going to get at least one call telling me they needed me there.
Then there was the customer. The one that can't make a decision because they are too stressed out. I spend the next 45 minuets trying to offer suggestions and the person with them won't be quiet long enough to let them think.

By the time it was all said and done, I had 15 minuets left of work and several things yet that I had to complete.
I got one of the things partially done.

Monday. I spend the day jumping every time the phone rings.
Breath a sigh of reilef when I know the store has closed.

Tuesday. I get a phone call from someone that I don't want to hear from. Someone who wants to talk for 2 plus hours and talks non stop.
And on top of that this person is the kind of person who has the ablity to make you feel like your being smothered.
Luckily I was on my way out the door.
When I get back, I'm now in a state of even bigger stress because I know I will get a call from work before thanks giving and I know that tomorrow this person will call again and hopefull I can tell them in a kind way I don't have the energy for them in my life.
I again breathe a sigh of relief when the store closes.
It's brief. I don't sleep so good.

Wensday. As sure as black clouds bring rain, the two things I have been waiting for happen. I get a call from this person, and luckily again I was on my way out the door. And work calls.
They are in need of me comming in and when I do I may end up being called up to do something I'm not very well trained at, and as a result I make lots of mistakes and end up with some really pissed off people.
While I'm at work, one of my relatives calls who I have asked not to call me, or contact me.
They have a history of ruining people's lives.
How they got my number in the first place was bugging someone that didn't realize they weren't suppose to give my number out.
I get home. I know that thanksgiving is tomorrow and I know that the person who I need to be blunt with is going to call and I don't sleep so good.

Thursday. Yep. They call. I have to be hard and blunt. They haven't in the past gotten the message that they require so much emotionaly energy that it takes time to recover from a phone call from them.
I don't like being hard. I don't like being cold. But there are times in my life that I've found that those are the only things that some people actually can hear before they stop doing the things that take so much.

I made it clear that they require too much energy for me to be able to be there to spend as much time as they require talking and talking.

With thoes things done, I was finally able to enjoy thanksgiving. Except I feel like I got ripped off. I couldn't enjoy the days I had off.
I spent them in a stressed state.

There are days that I would love to be able to just wander off somewhere and not have to think about being "on" for anyone or anything.

When I finish my day at work, I leave it there. I wasn't that way when I first started. I took it home with me and worked things over in my mind trying to come up with ideas that would make what I do make a difference.

Now, after three months, I don't do that anymore. When I'm at work, I give my all, and work hard. That's what I get paid to do.
When I come home, I don't think about work. It's not my problem anymore.
I know this corporation will survive, whether or not I make a difference or whether or not what I do or don't do makes any difference at all.
I have come to the place where I refuse to let work eat my life up.

I know I am disposable. Everyone is. Most people don't realize that they are about two paychecks away from being jobless, and very shortly there after loosing everything they've busted their asses to get.

It's the way things are here. Nothing is set in cement. And there are only two gaurentees in this life, one is that the goverment will require of you if you work, taxes, and the other is that at some point in time you will take your last breath.

Jobs get outsourced, jobs become extinct, jobs are filled by people who leave after one or two days and the end result is that no matter what you know about you in your heart, that you can be counted on, and that you will work hard, all the employer sees is a body to fill a space. That's it.

If your lucky, and you have a good relationship with the people you work with, it works in your favor, but sometimes it doesn't.
Sometimes it doesn't matter.
The company has decited to send the job you do and others you work with to a country where the same job can be done for so much less.
And then they just give you a notice that your job no longer exists.
That's what Gateway did to thousands of it's workers.
And that's just one company.

It all comes down to money. That stuff that people spend their lives working to get.
And in the end, even if they manage to be wise with what money they have, they may wake up one day and find that they are no longer needed.

They have to start over. If they are older than 20 something, getting a job is harder. They have to go through a whole lot of non sense, jump through hoops and learn in some cases how to be devious to get the job.

So anyway, here it is, thanksgiving night, I have a very early work day tomorrow, and I'm not ready for it. I know it won't slow down until after the first of the year. I hope that I can make it through with out pulling out all my hair.

It only looks that way because your standing on your head.