When I was a child, I dreaded Sundays.
I'm not sure why. There was some kind of feeling of wasted potential about them -- that I had not gone out and learned to fire a bow and arrow, that I had not constructed a remote control helicopter, that I had not done something worthwhile -- and now the weekend was going to end, and I would have lost this opportunity to do something, once again, just as I had last week.
It's Sunday. I have that feeling again.
I think it's because I have a project starting tomorrow. That idea that I had X days off since the last one, but tomorrow marks the end of those days, and I haven't accomplished anything. (Regardless of chores done, guests entertained, games played, etc.) And the work represents yet more time I'll spend in this terrible purgatory - no, limbo: purgatory at least has a hypothetical release date.
I told a coworker last week: these jobs give us experience we can never use. I have data and time served with the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and Federal Commodities Trade Commission and all sorts of other unwieldily named laws and agencies - and not one of them would recognize the job I do as meaningful experience. Because we're temps. We're held to a standard of meaningful lawyer-client ethical and professional obligations and we get fuck-all in return.
My unemployment insurance benefit period ended last week. This means almost nothing, only that I have to re-apply for benefits for the times when I'm not currently on a project. However, I've spent large chunks of time out of work in the last six or nine months, and the benefits look at the last five quarters to determine how much you made in that time in order to give you a percentage of that amount. Upshot: the possibility of a lot less money for the lean times.
So, I have to rely on having work that avails me nothing in the long run, and hope that it lasts long enough for the state to consider me a worthy reinvestment. I have to hope that I get a job I hate, that it lasts a long time, in order to receive welfare when it runs out.
I know my life is pretty good, but it feels pretty fucked up right now. I apologize if you're the kind of person who was getting used to the cheery, upbeat information here, lately, or if you're the kind of person who would rather not read f-bombs. But that's where I'm at, right now. That's the purpose of this page, in addition to helping people check and see if I'm still sucking air. Current status: repeating an identical course of action, hoping for different results.
--9:57 PM, EDT, Sunday, 9/15/2013, "You Can [Not] Advance"
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