Funkadelic Freak Out

Surprisingly I actually got a job today. Working through AmeriCorp of all places. There was a time early in the year I was getting set to join AmeriCorp, then I had some problems getting my application in order and one thing lead to another and I got Fallout 3 and time sort of slipped away. But a week ago I spotted something online talking about AmeriCorp and I thought I should take another look at my application. Turned out the problem I was having before was one most likely due to human error (surprisingly not mine) and it had been fixed. So I threw together an impassioned motivational statement and got a couple interviews and then a job offer. It was that fucking easy.

I have spent probably a hundred hours of time on job sites, another couple hundred writing cover letters, filling out applications, revising my resume (usually with factual information) and I got about ten interviews. The only time in the last year I got a job offer was for the new Ace's stadium, a job I only got because I was willing to stand in lines with hundreds of other applicants for hours on end, essentially hoping to win the job lottery they had going on. And yes, I did quit that job quickly, but only because it was awful and I would have been lucky to make four hundred dollars a month.

Granted, I did sort of give up for a while there (again I reference Fallout 3), but still, the private sector has not been my friend. I want to believe that it is because the people in charge of hiring realized that I would manage to get by on my rugged good looks and insatiable charm and they should hire those people that needed the job more than me. I'd like to believe that. In reality I think that it has to do with the fact that people don't seem to trust me when they first meet me. I've often suspected people see me and think "naive farm boy" and then they talk to me and start to think I've got some sort of strange, dark secret that isolates me from the rest of humanity. As though some sort of darkness got into me too early. Therapists call that projecting, assuming you know what other people are thinking and that they are thinking largely negative things about you. It's just that I get the strong sense that most people simply don't trust me at first. After a while I think it sinks in that I am just a bit of a loner who doesn't spend a lot of time chatting with new people, but it takes longer than an interview to come to that conclusion.

I awoke fairly early this morning and was done with what I needed to do by around 11. So I had quite a bit of time. And I realized that I sort of hate having that much time during the day. At night I have no sense of obligation of things that I could be/should be doing. The night is mine, I feel most comfortable there, safe in my own little world without the rest of the world bearing down on me with a stream of endless possibilities. The night doesn't expect anything out of you. There is great comfort in that. A sense of freedom, an ability to let go of doubts and regrets and to simply exist.

On an unrelated note, I haven't really been able to write any fiction since I moved back to Reno. Something has been blocking me every time I sit down to try to do any work. I know that I have to try to keep writing, I have to try to keep going no matter what. I heard a writer once say, "If you are blocked on one thing, work on something else." I just haven't taken that to heart. I wonder sometimes if I ever will. I have a penchant for writing, but I lack discipline, I lack drive. And lately I think that I have just been convincing myself not to write. For what reason, I don't know. But even when I seem to get a start of something going I'll just arbitrarily stop and do something else. I always think blogging or journaling will help to get me going, but it never does seem to. The only reason seems to be that I really only care about writing about myself, and I am reluctant to fictionalize myself in such a personal way. But that is a hurtle that needs to be overcome. Confidence, that is what I am lacking. Perhaps as things in my life begin to start getting going again, as they might with AmeriCorp, I can build some more confidence again. Being an unemployed slacker takes its toll on my sense of creative talent. I find I get much more writing done when I have a lot of other things on my plate.

I really hope that everything is going to work out with AmeriCorp. I made a commitment of a year, over a year technically since I won't officially start for at least a month since I still have training to go to, to a program that I really don't know a ton about. I guess it boils down to the fact that I am just nervous to take finally take a step away from jobs that require me to routinely clean out grease traps. Although I'm not sure that is it either. Even though as far as I can tell I am officially in the program now, I still get a strong sense that it is going to be taken away from me. That for the first time in a very long time something has apparently gone the way I wanted it to and it feels as though fate is simply playing a cruel joke on me, dangling the lolly in front of my carriage, so to speak. Perhaps I am just pessimistic, but I feel that I have earned the right to be pessimistic at this point. When it comes to jobs and women, things always seem to have a way of backfiring on me as soon as I think it is finally working out.