New Year Miscellanea

Working hard or hardly working?

A year ago, I was desperate for a job. I was living off of unemployment and a meagre $16 in food stamps. I felt like I was grinding my face into rock bottom. I got a job shortly after the new year, and, after a massive panic attack, I quit after five days. Fortunately, I found my current job, at a company I love working for. For the first time I have been able to say that I legitimately love my job; I have a boss that backs me up every time, amazing coworkers (both in the States and abroad), and a higher rate of pay than I ever made after 6 years at the last major telecommunications company I worked for (ironically, I am an outsourcer for one of their major competitors). I enjoy going to work and I'm consistently an hour early every day. I've sulccessfully trained three new hire classes, each one more successful than the last. I still struggle financially, but I work hard and I'm finally on the right track after so long. Having a job has helped my bipolar disorder even out and I have fewer and less dramatic mood swings. 2013 has been pretty decent to me. Sure, there were some times that I wasn't happy, like when my boss told me I wasn't getting my raise (but then, awesome boss that he is, he fought for and got me my raise a couple months later) and when he told me I had to move out of my office and take a desk at the call floor. But those are minor setbacks-- I had my hissy fit and moved on.

John and I are still together and stronger than ever. I don't have a ring on my finger yet and he still has roommates instead of me living with him, but I try to be patient. He's in grad school working toward his LCSW (Licensed Clinical Social Worker, for you that are too lazy to Google it) and I live vicariously through him, editing his papers and dreaming of some day going to grad school myself, if I can ever make up my mind and decide what I want to study.

I've kind of neglected this blog even though I've had so many things on my mind. Part of that is a little bit of fear of my coworkers finding my views offensive (at this point though, I think they know who I am) and part because I've had a hard time organizing those thoughts. And honestly, some of it is laziness. I'm going to try to update more, and not hold back. That's why I created this blog in the first place: to express myself and to use this a therapy. I need to continue to do so. I don't have many subscribers (a whole two) but I know my voice reaches a wider audience than that. Hopefully, some of what I say touches people. For now, I'll start some drafts for later posts.

Happy New Year!