Fear of change
So... I'm getting to the point where something's pretty much got to give. I've been planning my exit strategy from the theater for months now, and now that the wheels are finally kind of turning on that, I find myself absolutely paralyzed by fear.
On one hand, I cannot wait to get out of here. It's more than just being broke, although that plays a huge role. I do need to find something that will pay me more, even if it's just a little. But it's a principle thing, too. I realized yesterday, while walking to the train, that I've been here so long, it's actually a foreign concept to me to have an employer who actually has anything resembling respect for their employees. When I think back to my time at SSI, when my boss used to buy us breakfast all the time, take each of the admins to lunch once every couple of weeks, come in and joke around with us... as long as the work got done, it was fine. It's funny to say things like that about it now, because it was frightening and stressful at the time, and our actual, ultimate boss was a lot stricter than my direct supervisor, which gave the atmosphere this clandestine quality, but really... it was pretty cushy.
And I hated it. Maybe it was the 2 hour commute. Maybe it was the stress, and the fact that I was really depressed and eating poorly, and a thousand other factors. A lot of it was the commute. Some of it was that the workload always seemed insurmountable, even though I always got it done.
And I came here, and I think I had all these expectations, because everyone was so wonderful to work with in the box office, and Priscilla is such a sweetheart, and Tim was such a competent artist... And as it turns out, a horrible businessperson. I don't blame him, but I'm constantly frustrated when I feel like my ideas aren't respected, or that my suggestions are flat-out ignored in favor of the polar opposite. I read business and entrepreneurship books, it's not as if my ideas are just being pulled out of my ass, or that I'm a naive schoolgirl. And since then, everything has been systematically dismantled around me. All my best box office people quit or were fired. Every show has some new protocol or ten extra steps to accomplish. When we came here, the expectation was that we would be paid to sell tickets and write up the evening's financial report, keep watch over the cash boxes and take in the lobby displays. Now he wants my people to be a little fleet of underpaid admins, chugging away at stacks of data entry, logging surveys, constantly working at something. No facebook on the job which, for me, makes sense, because I'm constantly swamped. But box office hours are different. You're working. You're representing the company, you look good and talk well, when there's no one in the box office but you, what does it matter what you do?
And THEN there's the money. I mean... to put it in perspective, 70% of my income goes directly to my rent. Not my utilities, just my rent. Once you add in the bills I pay every month, $950 out of $1150 is gone. The other $200 is supposed to buy me groceries, pay for transit, put gas in my car, feed my cat, AND advance me into a better place in life. Hint. It doesn't do that. I also have been averaging at least $150 per month from Vaudezilla. When I first started performing, I promised myself that I would use that money solely for burlesque-related expenses, to create nice costumes and keep them up. A year and a half after I started performing, and I now depend on that money to purchase food just slightly more extravagant than ramen. A grand total of $0 goes toward burly-q upkeep. If I'm creating a new act, everything (and I mean EVERYTHING) has to be an item that's already in my closet and that I don't particularly *need* for anything else. I've been slowly rationing out the same bag of clear rhinestones for a year.
But. As much as I love playing the WOE IS ME card, you know, I signed up for this. I left the salary job with benefits that would have (I shit you not) kicked in three weeks after I left. I left for a reason. Expectations. You know.
Well... it's been two years, and I've kind of ridden this pony as far as it's going to go, and I'm not even sure there will *be* a full-time box office manager position to stay in, if things keep on keeping on like they are, and it's just time for a change.
And I'm fucking terrified. It's the unknown. It's people I don't know, and jobs I'm not familiar with, and who KNOWS how much supervision/direction/whatever. And that's cool and all, but because I have NO IDEA where I'm going to end up, for how much time, for how much money, for how much whatever, I'm pretty much just a ball of terror at this point.
I guess what it comes down to is that I feel trapped here. I feel like I need this place, because, if I wasn't here, I'd be adrift with no savings, no money, no prospects. If my position is terminated, I basically have a few weeks to pack my belongings and get back to Michigan, where there's no Vaudezilla, no Kenneth, no social interaction, and nothing but my crushing sense of failure.
I feel like I need this place, I hate this place, yet I feel like I don't deserve better. I feel like living the life I want is such an impossible fantasy, it doesn't even compute that I could maybe one day achieve it. And I feel that every attempt I've made to alleviate some of the need has basically been systematically dismantled. My Etsy shop is full of patterns, I probably spent about $500 on them over the course of the last year, and I've sold two. At a loss.
I feel like I'm trying to come to terms with the fact that I'm basically going to have to work 6-7 days a week, every week, with no vacations, until I drop dead.
I was walking to the train yesterday, and I was thinking about death, which I probably do a little bit too much for someone my age. But I was really just thinking about... if I were to die today, if some freak accident were to happen, the roof collapses, my train derails, whatever, would I be ok with the way my life has been led? And... the answer is no. I feel like I would just be thinking about how much time I've wasted, and how I didn't get to see Rammstein again. Which, lame, but that's where my priorities are. And I want to change it, so, *so* badly. It's just not... changing. The things I'm doing aren't getting me anywhere, and I'm still trapped here, in this goddamn windowless room.
On one hand, I cannot wait to get out of here. It's more than just being broke, although that plays a huge role. I do need to find something that will pay me more, even if it's just a little. But it's a principle thing, too. I realized yesterday, while walking to the train, that I've been here so long, it's actually a foreign concept to me to have an employer who actually has anything resembling respect for their employees. When I think back to my time at SSI, when my boss used to buy us breakfast all the time, take each of the admins to lunch once every couple of weeks, come in and joke around with us... as long as the work got done, it was fine. It's funny to say things like that about it now, because it was frightening and stressful at the time, and our actual, ultimate boss was a lot stricter than my direct supervisor, which gave the atmosphere this clandestine quality, but really... it was pretty cushy.
And I hated it. Maybe it was the 2 hour commute. Maybe it was the stress, and the fact that I was really depressed and eating poorly, and a thousand other factors. A lot of it was the commute. Some of it was that the workload always seemed insurmountable, even though I always got it done.
And I came here, and I think I had all these expectations, because everyone was so wonderful to work with in the box office, and Priscilla is such a sweetheart, and Tim was such a competent artist... And as it turns out, a horrible businessperson. I don't blame him, but I'm constantly frustrated when I feel like my ideas aren't respected, or that my suggestions are flat-out ignored in favor of the polar opposite. I read business and entrepreneurship books, it's not as if my ideas are just being pulled out of my ass, or that I'm a naive schoolgirl. And since then, everything has been systematically dismantled around me. All my best box office people quit or were fired. Every show has some new protocol or ten extra steps to accomplish. When we came here, the expectation was that we would be paid to sell tickets and write up the evening's financial report, keep watch over the cash boxes and take in the lobby displays. Now he wants my people to be a little fleet of underpaid admins, chugging away at stacks of data entry, logging surveys, constantly working at something. No facebook on the job which, for me, makes sense, because I'm constantly swamped. But box office hours are different. You're working. You're representing the company, you look good and talk well, when there's no one in the box office but you, what does it matter what you do?
And THEN there's the money. I mean... to put it in perspective, 70% of my income goes directly to my rent. Not my utilities, just my rent. Once you add in the bills I pay every month, $950 out of $1150 is gone. The other $200 is supposed to buy me groceries, pay for transit, put gas in my car, feed my cat, AND advance me into a better place in life. Hint. It doesn't do that. I also have been averaging at least $150 per month from Vaudezilla. When I first started performing, I promised myself that I would use that money solely for burlesque-related expenses, to create nice costumes and keep them up. A year and a half after I started performing, and I now depend on that money to purchase food just slightly more extravagant than ramen. A grand total of $0 goes toward burly-q upkeep. If I'm creating a new act, everything (and I mean EVERYTHING) has to be an item that's already in my closet and that I don't particularly *need* for anything else. I've been slowly rationing out the same bag of clear rhinestones for a year.
But. As much as I love playing the WOE IS ME card, you know, I signed up for this. I left the salary job with benefits that would have (I shit you not) kicked in three weeks after I left. I left for a reason. Expectations. You know.
Well... it's been two years, and I've kind of ridden this pony as far as it's going to go, and I'm not even sure there will *be* a full-time box office manager position to stay in, if things keep on keeping on like they are, and it's just time for a change.
And I'm fucking terrified. It's the unknown. It's people I don't know, and jobs I'm not familiar with, and who KNOWS how much supervision/direction/whatever. And that's cool and all, but because I have NO IDEA where I'm going to end up, for how much time, for how much money, for how much whatever, I'm pretty much just a ball of terror at this point.
I guess what it comes down to is that I feel trapped here. I feel like I need this place, because, if I wasn't here, I'd be adrift with no savings, no money, no prospects. If my position is terminated, I basically have a few weeks to pack my belongings and get back to Michigan, where there's no Vaudezilla, no Kenneth, no social interaction, and nothing but my crushing sense of failure.
I feel like I need this place, I hate this place, yet I feel like I don't deserve better. I feel like living the life I want is such an impossible fantasy, it doesn't even compute that I could maybe one day achieve it. And I feel that every attempt I've made to alleviate some of the need has basically been systematically dismantled. My Etsy shop is full of patterns, I probably spent about $500 on them over the course of the last year, and I've sold two. At a loss.
I feel like I'm trying to come to terms with the fact that I'm basically going to have to work 6-7 days a week, every week, with no vacations, until I drop dead.
I was walking to the train yesterday, and I was thinking about death, which I probably do a little bit too much for someone my age. But I was really just thinking about... if I were to die today, if some freak accident were to happen, the roof collapses, my train derails, whatever, would I be ok with the way my life has been led? And... the answer is no. I feel like I would just be thinking about how much time I've wasted, and how I didn't get to see Rammstein again. Which, lame, but that's where my priorities are. And I want to change it, so, *so* badly. It's just not... changing. The things I'm doing aren't getting me anywhere, and I'm still trapped here, in this goddamn windowless room.