(no subject)
So I'm back in St. Paul now, facing (with a sneaking sense of terrified incompetence) the prospect of Starting an Adult Life.
Practically speaking, what this means for the moment is
1) find a job
2) sort out various medical things
3) get started on voice lessons
4) call and email a few dozen friends and associates to return loaned items, reestablish friendships, ask advice, beg for favors, stuff with muffins, etc.
I'm doing okay on the first... I think? I dunno, I keep being haunted by a dream I had a couple of weeks ago in which I overheard my mother talking woefully to my father about my job prospects and saying "I mean, what can Anna do, really? Look good in a suit?" Of course this has nothing whatsoever to do with my mother's evaluation of my potential skills and employability and everything to do with my own. I'm trying to make a minimum of three concrete steps each day towards finding a job, "concrete" meaning actually submitting an enquiry, filling out an application, or going for an interview. It's ... damn hard. I have no proof of any skills to offer, really, except for a college degree. I can type, I can write, I can speak mediocre German and French and have just enough Japanese to embarrass myself thoroughly in any situation demanding actual communication. I can care passionately about something and speak eloquently on its behalf and sound as though I know what the hell I'm talking about. I can smile pretty. And yeah, I can look good in a suit.
But I haven't done anything, and job listing after job listing specifically demands experience in the given area. I'm having trouble even finding waitressing jobs in good restaurants that don't require "a minimum of a year of fine dining experience". (Well, I've dined finely, I just haven't actually, y'know, been on the service end of it yet...)
So I'm crafting various resumés that portray a selective, carefully worded version of the truth, and sending them out to everyone from a little music school in the suburbs looking for part-time voice teachers to a radio show looking for a paid intern to a couple of tutoring companies to a dozen little cafés and restaurants, and trying not to cry into the DEAFENING SILENCE that greets these meek little forays into the realm of honest employment.
After all, it's only been two days...
Having trouble facing the medical stuff. I really, really, REALLY don't want to go see more doctors, not even just for the basic check-up type stuff that needs to happen, much less a psychiatrist or two, another neurologist, a gynecologist, and whateverall else. But I haven't felt very well since getting back to Minnesota -- mild headaches every day, general lethargy and low spirits, photosensitivity, etc. -- and I know it's something I need to get on, in case I'm headed for another bout of ugliness. God forbid.
And I'm having the hardest time ever contacting people on a social basis. That's the hardest of all. I'm in such deep hermit mode at the moment that I'm having trouble even, say, leaving livejournal comments or replying to emails from home.
It's weird-- 'hermit mode' doesn't mean that I can't interact pleasantly if I'm brought face-to-face with someone; if my housemates knock on my door, if I go get something from the grocery store, I'm perfectly chatty and charming. You'd never guess I wasn't an extrovert. But I have to trick myself into sending a facebook message to my old voice teacher, and I haven't yet been able to write to or call a single MN friend. I hate it so much when I get like this-- my whole world seems to contract to the size of my bedroom, the size of my own head, which is a fairly dull place to be at the moment.
This afternoon, while walking through the gorgeous sunny afternoon to pick up an application at a little café in Como Park, I suddenly realized: I worry a LOT.
I have been told this many times before, and somehow never believed it. It was like climbing a mountain high enough that you can see the curve of the horizon, and recognize that yes, in fact, the world IS round. Everyone always said so, all the abstract, objective evidence pointed in that direction, and yet in your moment-to-moment life it's just not how things seem.
I don't know why I worry so much. My life hasn't really been that disastrous so far. I have it pretty damn good, a fact which I notice at least once a day (usually while reading the newspaper).
Really I'm just a whiner.
Practically speaking, what this means for the moment is
1) find a job
2) sort out various medical things
3) get started on voice lessons
4) call and email a few dozen friends and associates to return loaned items, reestablish friendships, ask advice, beg for favors, stuff with muffins, etc.
I'm doing okay on the first... I think? I dunno, I keep being haunted by a dream I had a couple of weeks ago in which I overheard my mother talking woefully to my father about my job prospects and saying "I mean, what can Anna do, really? Look good in a suit?" Of course this has nothing whatsoever to do with my mother's evaluation of my potential skills and employability and everything to do with my own. I'm trying to make a minimum of three concrete steps each day towards finding a job, "concrete" meaning actually submitting an enquiry, filling out an application, or going for an interview. It's ... damn hard. I have no proof of any skills to offer, really, except for a college degree. I can type, I can write, I can speak mediocre German and French and have just enough Japanese to embarrass myself thoroughly in any situation demanding actual communication. I can care passionately about something and speak eloquently on its behalf and sound as though I know what the hell I'm talking about. I can smile pretty. And yeah, I can look good in a suit.
But I haven't done anything, and job listing after job listing specifically demands experience in the given area. I'm having trouble even finding waitressing jobs in good restaurants that don't require "a minimum of a year of fine dining experience". (Well, I've dined finely, I just haven't actually, y'know, been on the service end of it yet...)
So I'm crafting various resumés that portray a selective, carefully worded version of the truth, and sending them out to everyone from a little music school in the suburbs looking for part-time voice teachers to a radio show looking for a paid intern to a couple of tutoring companies to a dozen little cafés and restaurants, and trying not to cry into the DEAFENING SILENCE that greets these meek little forays into the realm of honest employment.
After all, it's only been two days...
Having trouble facing the medical stuff. I really, really, REALLY don't want to go see more doctors, not even just for the basic check-up type stuff that needs to happen, much less a psychiatrist or two, another neurologist, a gynecologist, and whateverall else. But I haven't felt very well since getting back to Minnesota -- mild headaches every day, general lethargy and low spirits, photosensitivity, etc. -- and I know it's something I need to get on, in case I'm headed for another bout of ugliness. God forbid.
And I'm having the hardest time ever contacting people on a social basis. That's the hardest of all. I'm in such deep hermit mode at the moment that I'm having trouble even, say, leaving livejournal comments or replying to emails from home.
It's weird-- 'hermit mode' doesn't mean that I can't interact pleasantly if I'm brought face-to-face with someone; if my housemates knock on my door, if I go get something from the grocery store, I'm perfectly chatty and charming. You'd never guess I wasn't an extrovert. But I have to trick myself into sending a facebook message to my old voice teacher, and I haven't yet been able to write to or call a single MN friend. I hate it so much when I get like this-- my whole world seems to contract to the size of my bedroom, the size of my own head, which is a fairly dull place to be at the moment.
This afternoon, while walking through the gorgeous sunny afternoon to pick up an application at a little café in Como Park, I suddenly realized: I worry a LOT.
I have been told this many times before, and somehow never believed it. It was like climbing a mountain high enough that you can see the curve of the horizon, and recognize that yes, in fact, the world IS round. Everyone always said so, all the abstract, objective evidence pointed in that direction, and yet in your moment-to-moment life it's just not how things seem.
I don't know why I worry so much. My life hasn't really been that disastrous so far. I have it pretty damn good, a fact which I notice at least once a day (usually while reading the newspaper).
Really I'm just a whiner.