I May Be Headed Back Into the Machine
After three and a half grueling interviews over the course of three weeks, I may be headed back into the Machine. After a phone call, a phone interview, an in-person interview at a branch location and an in-person interview at their corporate office, I may be headed back into the office grind. Or I may not be. I actually have no idea.
While I did well in each interview and was selected to move on, at no point did anyone seem that excited about hiring me, or me about working there. It seems their biggest concern with me was my “longevity with the company,” or lack thereof. I’m a smart person, and can do well in these types of settings, but I can’t feign interest or excitement. I don’t really want to work there, I just want a job so my wife and I don’t have to be homeless. I didn’t do a great job of hiding that fact.
They may call or email me later today or tomorrow and tell me I’m hired. Or they might not. I keep searching my feelings and finding that I don’t care either way. I might actually be happier if they turn me down, so I can keep hope alive that I might find a job I like doing. Through the whole process I think they were looking for a reason not to hire me, and couldn’t find any. On paper I would be a great employee at their company. I actually worked for this company many years ago and did fine. It all seemed fine, but there was this sense that it just wasn’t quite right, that they should say no, but couldn’t determine exactly why.
From a practical standpoint I should be hoping beyond hope that I get this job. Our economy has been destroyed, small businesses have been wiped out, looting and destruction abound, and unemployment is at all-time highs. Entire industries are completely shut down. Nobody is working these days. The prospect of a steady job at a time like this should be enthralling. Somehow, it isn’t. I can’t pretend to want to do something I don’t want to do. I may end up doing it anyway.
Maybe something is inherently wrong with me. Maybe I just don’t want to work. Maybe I’m giving up on my dreams. Maybe I need to focus on what I like doing and if we starve, we starve. Maybe I don’t like that I’m giving in to values that are not my own, the notion that I’ve got to find something to pay the bills, anything to keep us afloat. I don’t believe that but maybe what I believe doesn’t matter anymore. When I applied at this job, I had this sense that I shouldn’t, that these people would actually get in contact with me. They did, and now I almost have a job. Or I don’t. I’m fine with either. Maybe I’m not fine, maybe I want to get paid to write and don’t know how to get there. Maybe I just don’t have the perseverance to succeed. Barriers show up, things get difficult and I just give up. Maybe I’m just a regular person whose dreams are just as absurd as everyone else’s. Maybe I have no idea how to live life. Maybe I’ll never know.
This is my constant internal dialogue, my incessant acceptance and rejection of myself, acceptance and rejection of reality, the push and pull of my dreams and practicality, the norms and values of others against mine, the old world against the new. It hurts, man. It hurts to be alive today and second guess every single choice I make. I’ve never felt this lost; I am waving my arms around in pitch darkness and finding nothing. I really hope there is a God out there because I need him now more than ever.
