I was feeling like I was starting to come out of my funk a little. I looked for work and had a couple of interviews. A few places even wanted to hire me.
At one place, after I started the over 8 hours of training at home that I wasn’t going to be getting paid for, I found out that the job wasn’t going to be as advertised. I applied for overnight stalker but what I got was 1 month overnight stocker and 2 months of being on the sales floor. I would have to switch my sleep times twice for this job! Then they said they’d give me a 40% off card so I could go buy all their clothes because that is what I have to wear to work, not allowed to wear any of my own clothes! And whereas the job was only seasonal (3 Months) and part-time I wouldn’t have very much pay left over after I bought all the clothes that I would need for work. A criminal records check is needed (that’s no problem) but in another section of the training they said that at the end of every shift I would have to go find another employee and go to the front exit, turn and face the camera and have this other employee check my bags. I talked to a friend about the position and she said all that is normal for a retail job. Guess I’m not ever going to be working retail.
At another place I passed the interview but there was some mix-up when they wanted me to start. Again I thought it was a part-time job but that changed after the interview. At this point I’m starting to find out that part-time doesn’t mean short shifts and only 25 to 30 hrs a week. It can be anything employers want it to be. By the time I got it straight when I was supposed to start, I got sick the morning of my first shift so I called in sick. The same thing happened for the next 3 days so I told them that I wasn’t going to be able to work there. I thought it was just my nerves about going back to work after almost dying at my last job. And this job was dealing with food and I was worried about poisoning someone because I didn’t know what I was doing. People don’t die if I screw up in bookkeeping, one more reason why I want a desk job.
For the third job I passed the interview, completed the ½ day orientation, and had a full day of training (I was left alone to watch videos and answer questions on a computer). Then I worked one shift. I couldn’t walk the next day. Ya see I applied for an administrative position. In the interview, they said that position wasn’t available at the moment and offered me a cashier position instead. I figured I’d ask for a chair because I know I can’t stand that long even if they do have those special mats that are supposed to help you. Well, instead of putting me on a cash register they put me on monitoring the self-checkouts so no place for a chair, no mats to stand on and way more customers to interact with and I don’t like interacting with people so I thought that if I was on a regular/normal cash register I would have fewer people to deal with, but no, I wasn’t even that lucky.
Over the past seven months I’ve had 8 more people pass away that I knew. That’s a total of 14 people that I know that died this year, 15 if ya count the Queen but I never hung out with her. The war in Ukraine is still going on but less front page news these days. Death is everywhere I look.
October was the one-year anniversary of the passing of one of my friends that lived down the street from me and that I used to go to darts with. I’m also still friends with her granddaughter who lives out west, whenever she comes home to good old Nova Scotia we hang out. For a writer I was lost for words when she came home this October, a lot of quiet drives but I did create a new playlist on Spotify of songs she likes and that I like now, modern songs, not my usual classic rock-and-roll. Before my friend passed away last year she gave me her Stephen King book collection. I was thrilled with the books but didn’t know how to deal with the approaching death of someone I cared about as a friend. I was awkward yet grateful, not just grateful for her books but her friendship right to the end. Back in October last year I was playing the strong person. Strong for my friend whose nan passed away, strong for our friends at the Legion where we had played darts, strong for my family who was relying on me to look after things while my dad was in and out of the hospital, strong to carry on at work despite being in a job where I was in over my head, strong for my son who was just getting used to life on his own while attending university and keeping a GPA over 4.1. I can only be strong for so long. October this year just brought back all the memories. And now I have no one to talk to, my friend that I used to go to to talk with died in March this year. I feel so alone.
I couldn’t even get into watching Notre Dame college football this year, I watched a few games but there was no cheering and yelling at the TV like in past years, I just couldn’t feel it. Not sure if they’re going to make it to a bowl game or not, they didn’t win every game this year.
I couldn’t get into watching NASCAR either. My husband’s driver is changing teams next year so all the merch that I had bought since we started watching NASCAR together over a dozen years ago is now what. What do I do with it? My driver was always switching teams so I knew better than to buy his merch and he didn’t have much for merch anyway because he wasn’t as popular as my husband’s driver. Then this year my driver got injured and is no longer driving, ever. Do I stop watching NASCAR? Do I pick a new driver? How do I pick a new driver?
Never celebrated any holidays this fall. Never went anywhere for the September long weekend nor did we do anything special. I bought a card for my son’s birthday but he never came over because they fixed the washer and dryer in his apartment so I never got to give it to him. My mom spent Thanksgiving with her church friends, my son spent it with his girlfriend, and my husband and I did nothing. I never handed out candy at Halloween, never went to a haunted house, nor did I decorate, nor did I have a séance or set a place at the table for a loved one for supper on Halloween, all things I’ve done in the past but never did this year. Though I did get dressed up and went to a private party at a community hall (no drinking) and did win a prize for my costume. That’s me in the pictures at the top, looking pretty butch I must say. I loved it, being the opposite gender, wearing make-up and fancy clothes (the heels were iffy but with practice, I’m sure I could get used to them), dressing up as someone else, someone that no one recognized. Not having to be me for a little while was a nice break.
Obviously, I wasn’t in any shape to do NaNoWriMo this year. I’m still making notes on story ideas but not putting anything into any concrete long form. I’m just happy I’ve been able to still write this blog, even as messed up as it’s been this year.
I’m not sure where this blog goes. After I post/publish an entry it says it was sent to 24 emails. Does that mean I have an email list somewhere of people that look forward to getting my updates? If that’s the case those people are now aware that even though I may have written these on the dates that it says they were published, I never actually put them out into the world to be read until December 7th. I’m an honest person, I had to let you all know that. I think for future readers that it looks good to have them published the way I did them that’s why I did it my way. If any of you are good with Word Press and want to give me any tips and pointers it will be greatly appreciated. I’m thinking of doing away with my website and just keeping this blog as it has way more content. Let me know what ya think or if you can help, don’t be shy, I’ve lost friends this year and I need to replenish my numbers.
TJ Baker - Writer 