New Job

After a pretty horrible year being unemployed and broke, I rejoined my previous firm, but in a new role. To be honest, I was not particularly excited about the role because it seems fake, fraudulent somehow. I work with a company that doesn't create anything. It only aggregates and sorts stuff. So, the work NEVER excited me. But the people were/are nice and went above and beyond in accommodating my shitty work ethic when I got depressed because I was good my first year.

That's the background. Sort of. This company had just begun in my city, and I was one of the first employees. And I was doing well. I felt like I belonged. And a year down the line, things started changing, as is wont to happen...practically everywhere. New people came in. People who were friends of my boss. They'd quickly formed a clique I felt excluded from. It was like being back at high school. It's like that shit will never leave you alone. Overall nice people, though....so the problem was/is always with me. The minute I detected a threat, my motivation fell. I began to disengage. And other shit happened in my personal life that shoved me down a spiral of depression. It got so bad that I didn't feel like getting out of bed. All this happened to me while a new and exciting project was picking up pace at work. They wanted me to one of the core team members, but I just couldn't bring myself to show up and participate regularly. Also, decisions were getting made in the clique, and the rest of us heard about them only later. This shit was/is insidious, and I will always react badly to this, I suppose. I have never learnt how to deal with this in a sensible, adult way. But I need to, because office politics will exist...everywhere. Long story short, I eventually lost that job.

One year later, though, I ended up back at the same company...despite many misgivings. I felt like I owed them a debt, for their consideration and support when I was ill. Also, I suppose I had a point to prove...mostly to myself, that I am not as bad at work as I've come to believe. Also, I needed to pick up new skills, and this role, although "underhanded," offered that possibility. And two months into the new job, here I am...wondering if I've made a gigantic mistake coming back. It's the same people, and the same cliques, and for me, the same alienation. Never feel like I belong here now. Cannot talk to the people. And worse, I feel too old mentally for my new role. I feel like I don't even understand the job. My teammates are all young...in their early to mid-20s. I'm in my early 30s, but I've always felt and acted like a goddamn grandma...a LUDDITE grandma. And I now work with SEO, which I thought was mostly about writing articles. Turns out that's only a small part of it. Content generation has changed face so drastically. You've got to keep churning out content, that isn't necessarily super valuable all the time, but LOOKS good. I've never been able to do "looks good" well. And after 10 years of editing, suddenly having to write is daunting. My writing sounds soooooo clunky, and my voice is "old" and "preachy." The team puts out such "young" "hip" content, tons of mistakes be damned. I HATE this. I HATE my job. This is NOT what I want to do with my life. But I'm stuck, once again. Create shit. Write shit. Then repurpose this shit to present it in different ways. All of this is done to earn links. It's not about the content itself. It's not really about creating anything really. It's just about earning links to your site, blog or whatever. So, most days, even 2 months later, I feel like I don't understand my job. Because, while creating this shit content is one part, I have to spend time trying to find new avenues on the net where I can post these links. Self-promotion, really. Something I've never been good at. Something the inner-me scoffs at. I mean, shouldn't your work just speak for you? Why do we even need to promote ourselves? I clearly don't understand how the world works, and a huge part of me doesn't want to. Therein lies the problem.

Anyway, for now, I'm stuck here. With this job. I have to learn to enjoy it. Do it well. So, I can tell myself I don't completely suck, and have a chance of survival in this world. I must put in effort after work to learn this thing so I can be on top of the job, and compete with my young, hip coworkers. Will I ever get there? I have to spend time drawing maps and plans first, to understand the different aspects of my job, and do each a little everyday. I have to make this work. I cannot lose this job.

Gratitude

So I began this blog in my mid-twenties, mostly to complain about how I'm not getting laid. That changed for a while, but I'm back to not getting laid. And now I know whining about it isn't really going to get me anywhere (not that actually getting laid did either!) I'll periodically keep posting about my attempts to get laid as well. But meanwhile, I want to start "Gratitude" posts. Just lists of things I'm grateful for, so I remember how much better things are for me...mostly to curb that annoying habit I have of whining too much.

So here goes:

1. I'm really grateful my dad's who he is. I've whined a lot about how he's just another average UNWOKE Indian guy who's sooo horribly entrenched in the patriarchy, but considering where and how he grew up, he's by far a lot more WOKE than I give him credit for. The guy tries. Sure, it can't be easy for him to get bullied by both of us feminazis in the house, and he is an extreme introvert like me, who's actually not had the best of lives, despite everything. I'm really grateful that I can still argue with him...and I KNOW he tortures himself over things silently, just like I do (Why do we inherit these traits only?). I am really grateful that he understands or at least tries to understand me and mom, and he's at heart just a big pile of mush who has trouble expressing himself. I just want him to be happy and healthy and find some sort of fulfillment in life. I hope he stops worrying that I'm not married or whatever. And I just hope we can have real conversations without tearing each other to shreds. But mostly, THANK YOU, for such a great dad!

2. Another thing I've been whining off late, mostly to blame circumstances instead of owning up to my horrible faults, is how I should've studied engineering. I'm really grateful I studied what I did, and I don't EVER want to forget how much fun I had in college and Uni. Those were the few years in my life when I actually felt like I belonged somewhere. For a few years, I had a home, and I don't want to forget that. I made a mess of things later, but for a few years, I was on the precipice of something truly awesome, and I very much needed that after those awful awful US years. And for a long time, I also worked in the field I wanted to. Only after I started running after money and, even worse, started really messing up at work, did things get sidetracked so horribly. It was me. I wholly messed things up for myself. No one else. And still, I've been fortunate enough to not completely be thrown off things. I can still get back into the groove, and I did land a great freelance gig that I enjoy very much. I am grateful for all of this, because if after 10 years of fucked up drudgery, if you don't realize that you've got to enjoy what you do for 8 hours a day, you (me) are a total ass. I'm grateful I still can. I hope I work hard at it and get better and can one day again feel proud of my work.

3. I'm grateful for this fuck-buddy thing that I did to myself. I fell in love with the asshole, despite carefully selecting the guy so I WONT fall in love with him. So, yes...once again, it has been proven. Sex fucks up EVERYTHING. It ended, and I was shattered. It wasn't too great while it lasted either, but it shattered me wayyy worse than I expected it to. Comes of living a very sheltered life, I suppose. Spiralled into depression, messed up my health, still trying to process the very painful life lessons and bitterness. I've changed as a person because of this...not a good change. But I guess this brought home to me how thin-skinned I am, and that's not good. At all. I need to put myself out there for more rejection, so I one day can take it in my stride. Gotta learn detachment. Gotta learn never to put someone else above my own self-worth. Lessons I should've learnt in my early 20s, but I guess I'm glad it happened now. Also, I'm glad it was him and not some potentially much worse guy. I just want to come out of it soon, and relatively thick-skinned now, with enough emotional armor in place for the next time around. But I'm glad it happened.

Big things I'm grateful for. Life lessons, mostly, but I hope I can come back to read these and learn to just be happy about things and whine a little less.

I haven't felt alive in ages. And I completely hate the person I have become in the last decade. I hate her. She only rains on everything...and she's whiny and petty and OH SO BORING!

Can you imagine how EXHAUSTING it is to be boring ALL THE fucking time? Ugh.

I probably ought to attribute this deadness to not getting laid. The last time I actually enjoyed sex was over 2 years ago. And I have completely lost the ability to talk to people...fuck talking. I can't even make EYE contact and mutter something remotely coherent so people don't look at me like I lost all essence of my humanity. It's like I'm black and white in a riot of instafiltered, primary colored world. I'm invisible. No...unfortunately, not completely invisible. Just utterly drained of any color and every smidgen of personality.

I seriously doubt one random fuck with some fuckwit I pick up on Tinder is going to set this right. Especially when I will not come.