Unfortunately, I have had quite a few jobs in the service industry. For me, these jobs are like cockroaches or a stalker ex-boyfriend or the herp…they just keep reappearing, no matter how many times you try to get rid of them.*
I guess that’s what I get for going to grad school for English. I sort of feel sorry for Sinclair of 18 years old, thinking she could TOTALLY go into publishing because y’all, my mom told me I could do ANYTHING. Instead, here I am, four years after grad school, just now having hooked a job that has anything to do with what I studied. I feel like there was an easier way to do this…
I digress. Here is why nobody should ever hire me to work in the service industry, ever, ever, ever again:
1. LATENESS AND MORNING HATE.
If a job requires me to be somewhere at 8:00 AM, it is maybe the biggest struggle of my life to be there on time, and I swear to you I am thisclose to being late every single day. You can bet your ass that I will be getting up at 9:00 or later every day from tomorrow until the end of time because I HATE HATE HATE HATE HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAATE mornings.
Stupid morning, what with its little singing birds and dew on the grass GET OFF MY FEET DEW I’M TRYING TO GET TO WORK ON TIME AND YOU HAVE ALREADY RUINED MY DAY BY MAKING MY SANDALS AND THE BOTTOMS OF MY PANTS WET THANKSALOT.
Then, there’s the whole traffic issue. I live down a road that is two lanes with no passing zones anywhere. This makes me furious, only because people don’t drive the way I tell them to. HAY THE SPEED LIMIT IS 45 AND YOU ARE GOING EXACTLY 45 WHY AREN’T YOU DOING 60 YOU WASTE OF A HUMAN BODY. Also I feel it is necessary to point out that presently I only live about five miles away from my job, yet I have to leave at 7:fricking40 on the dot to pull into the parking lot at 8:00 and runrunrunrunrun my ass into the building.
After I do this, I sit down, out of breath, at the front desk. WHEW I say to myself. Except then people start coming into the building and for some reason expect me to talk to them when I do not even have ample coffee amounts in my bloodstream to open my eyes. Yes, I drive to work asleep. For one year and a half, I have said “hey” in the morning to, on average, 50 people per morning. Instead of “hey,” I am really thinking, “I hate you and I hope you never talk to me again.” I say this to people with whom I have no problem when the morning crazies have left my body. It’s still beyond me, however, as to why anyone would expect me to acknowledge their presence at such an ungodly hour.
2. INTERNAL STRUGGLES WITH SELF RE:AUTHORITY.
Though my mother and father brought me up to be a good little girl who respects her elders and doesn’t question authority, I ended up not turning out that way…at least not in my head. I have a serious problem when the people in power do idiotic things that are not at all based on logic, but since I was raised in the South where you have to shut your mouth about things you don’t like, I have internal conversations on a daily basis that go like this:
Me: Ok so I have to make people sign in at the front desk. That’s part of the job, no matter how much I hate it or think it’s stupid.
Self: But why? There is absolutely no reason. Nobody looks at these logs where people sign in. You put them in a binder and NOBODY LOOKS AT THEM. This is ridiculous and irrational and I WANT JUSTICE.
Me: I know but you also want to keep your job, right? Especially since you ALREADY GOT LAID OFF THREE TIMES IN ONE YEAR? DO YOU REMEMBER THAT?
Self: (sheepishly)…yes. But it still doesn’t seem right to do something irrational just because someone tells you to.
Me: ….
SHUT UP AND DO WHAT I TELL YOU! YOUR MOTHER WOULD BE SO DISAPPOINTED IF I TOLD HER THIS! YOU ARE A PROPER SOUTHERN LADY NOW ACT LIKE IT GODDAMMIT!
Self: You just cursed. That’s not very ladylike.
Me: (turning bright shade of red) YOU ARE REALLY PISSING ME OFF AND IF I COULD GET RID OF YOU I WOULD! I DON’T EVEN REMEMBER WHAT WE’RE FIGHTING ABOUT!
I’m pretty sure people can see this going on in my head when I’m told to do something I don’t want to do, but I paste a crooked painful smile on my face and do it anyway. I’m pretty sure they can also see the lasers that are on the verge of shooting out of my eyes into the middle of their foreheads.
3. DANGEROUS SPIDERLIKE TENDENCIES.
I have a somewhat reclusive nature, especially when working, because I need to block out all distractions SLASH I lean towards introversion in a very real way. Although I hate spiders more than I hate mornings, please feel free to think of me as a brown recluse- happy in its own little woodpile, and REALLY PISSED OFF when exposed or bothered.
It pains me to put this on my blog but I feel you need a concrete representation of what I am asking you to visualize. Just kidding, I kinda just want to skeeve you out. Is that wrong?
This is why working from home is the most perfect thing I could ever dream up for myself and why service industry jobs for me are like someone taking my hand, breaking all of my fingers one by one, then putting my hand on the ground, and THEN jumping up and down on it until it further breaks into a billion shards of bone and hand-flesh-pieces. I actually do like people, I just don’t like interacting with them 8:00 to 5:00, Monday to Friday, all day long, with no place to hide if I need a minute or need to eat my breakfast without 30 people commenting on what I’m eating (YES IT’S GRANOLA NO I’M NOT A HIPPIE).
I LIKE WHOLE GRAINS NOT NASTY HAIR.
Seriously, I swear to you on the grave of Kurt Cobain that is how serious I am, one of the doctors that works here just said to me, “I’m gonna miss your pretty smile in the morning.” <—– WEIRD. It’s like I’m an evil troll living in a the body of a normal, likeable person. I even feel a little bad about being so bitchy in this post. Not that bad.
What I look like.
What I feel like.
4. PHONE HATE.
This is the last reason why I should not be made to work in the service industry ever again. I hate talking on the phone more than I hate either spiders or mornings.
I don't know what this means in terms of this blog post but I am strangely drawn to it.
I hate talking on the phone so much that on multiple occasions (by multiple I mean at least a hundred times I am not joking), I have hung up from a call with my mother and wondered, “Did I just make mom cry again?” It’s not her, it’s not whoever I’m talking to, it’s me and my intense phone hate.
When I hear the phone ring, sometimes before I pick up I actually growl at it or mutter a string of obscenities that include “What the @^$#%! do you want, stop calling here.” If my supervisor has overheard this, she has not mentioned it. I think receptionists are probably not supposed to act this way, which is why I should never be one ever again.
DID YOU HEAR THAT UNIVERSE? STOP GIVING ME SERVICE INDUSTRY JOBS PLEASE. THANK YOU FOR THE WORK FROM HOME EDITING JOB I REALLY APPRECIATE IT AND I WILL WORK REALLY HARD AT IT AND I’M GLAD YOU SEE I’VE PAID MY DUES WITH SERVICE INDUSTRY JOBS NOW IT’S TIME TO NEVER GIVE ME ONE OF THOSE AGAIN. OK THANKS FOR YOUR TIME XOXO, SINCLAIR.
*Disclaimer #1: I don’t have the herp or stalker ex-boyfriends or a cockroach problem. That was a simile, not a confession.
*Disclaimer #2: I realize this post makes me sound a little like the Unabomber, which I’m not. I’m actually pretty social and nice most of the time. That is all.
avocadoexplosion! 