I almost worked myself to death this week, at least in the spoiled Western sense of the concept. I got heat stroke Wednesday evening and didn’t even realize it and then went to work with it on Thursday even though I was physically quite ill.  Why didn’t I just stay home?   Nobody would have missed me one iota.  The work could have waited.  Instead I chose to torture myself for fear that I would be seen as shirking.  That’s not the real fear though. The real fear is that the other shoe will drop the minute I’m not paying attention.  It’s going to drop anyway.  I don’t have that kind of control.

The best part of the whole arc of the week, and the reason it occurred to me to write this now, is that my business partner is on maternity leave for two months.  That means I have to do her job in addition to mine.  Given that as non-profit leaders we each do the jobs of about 2.5 – 3 people most of the time, it is entirely too much.  I went to a child’s party with her and her children yesterday, and I think she wanted me along primarily to help with her older child and not for my scintillating company.  I mentioned something about work, and her only response was a big fat “I told you so.”  First of all, she did not tell me so. It just felt good for her to say it in that moment.  Secondly, it was a big fat slap in the face after I’ve been busting my ass to do her job while she goes off and communes with her lovely family for two months.  I’m working this hard and all I’m going to hear is “I told you so?!”

This will be the second summer I spend practically killing myself because someone else is lucky enough to have love in their lives and decides to have a baby.  And admittedly because I don’t want this place to suffer as a result.  And it appears that this will be the second summer I get to the end of to be told that I did it all wrong while they were gone.  As the princess said to the frog: I. Don’t. Fucking. Think. So.

If the other shoe is indeed going to drop, because it always does no matter how hard I work, and all I’m going to hear is criticism anyway, then I need to figure out why I’m doing this in the first place – or at least remember it – and decide if it’s worth it to me anymore.   My short-term goal is to tell every single person who has the bad manners to say “I told you so” to go straight to hell, or at least tell them that if they’re that much smarter than me, they should have done it themselves. I’m done offering to do anything for anyone else.  It feels good momentarily, but I don’t have it to give anymore, and they don’t appreciate it in the end.  I’m done killing myself for a job that yields little to no personal satisfaction, is a professional dead end, and is physically killing me.  I’m tired of constantly making a right turn every time I come to a stop sign and then wondering why I’m back in the same place again.  Nope, I’m making a left turn this time.  I have absolutely nothing to lose.

So now I’m feeling a hankering to get another one, and all I can think about is that it’s really hard to hide two tattoos.  And then I feel absurd that I’m an adult and I’m trying to hide this from someone whose idea of being acceptable is so narrow that I never measured up anyway.   I also realize I’m a bit old to think that this is something novel and exciting – tattoos are for teenagers and twenty-somethings in my head for some reason.  Even my friend referred to it as a fetish that I have even though she has three tattoos.  Of course she got her first at the age of 14 so I guess my doing this at 37 probably seems a bit odd to her, but then she thinks I’m ancient anyway.  But they can all go to hell. I loved getting my first tattoo and would like to get another one soon. Maybe that will be my reward for being nicer to myself and conquering my workaholic tendencies!

The only problem is that the silence was deafening.  No e-mails, no phone calls, no nothing.  It’s actually true that all I have going on in my life is my job.  And that has to change, because it won’t love me back and the further along I get with my job the less it will be about any personal satisfaction at all.  In fact, that element of it – the personal satisfaction – is almost entirely gone. And that has to change too.

I spent a lot of time thinking about goals, making lists, and then paring the lists down to what didn’t stress me out or make me feel inadequate.  Now I feel good. I feel rested.  And I don’t want going back to work to ruin that.  And that’s really the task at hand: how to have this job without feeling like a truck ran over me all the time.  For the first time in a really long time, I think I can do it.  And if I can’t, it won’t be worth it to me to stay.  But the best part is that if I do leave, I won’t feel like I failed or like I ran away.

I don’t have friends because my job ate my life and I’m socially impaired.  I don’t have a hobby for the same reason.  Perhaps my apartment will get really really clean!  Or I’ll get started on getting back into shape.  But living for a week without my job may require a 12-step program.  Or maybe I’ll never want to go back.

The worst part is that I can’t talk about it with my father or my sisters in any meaningful way.  My sister called to say how sad she was and to ask if I was sad.  I minimized it, but tried to validate what she was feeling.  The truth is that it makes me excruciatingly sad.  But the unspoken rule in our house was that we weren’t to make a drama out of anything, and that showing your feelings or talking about them was selfish and silly.  It just wasn’t tolerated.

What’s really funny is that every year on this date I just want to tell someone about it.  I just want what happened to us to be acknowledged and therefore real.  And yet I don’t do that within my own family.  I told my sister it made me horribly sad, and to realize that it’s been 20 years is astonishing.  But it still felt like I was swallowing a boulder to say that much.

Because my sofa was supposed to replace my futon, I had placed an advert for my futon on craigslist.  I got a million responses because the futon was free.  One guy showed up out of the blue, rang my phone to be let up but then someone just let him in on their own and he appeared at my door.  He has his friend come up with him and they haul off my futon to the elevator. I instruct them clearly to go to the basement.  I took the stairs to meet them there.  I waited and waited and waited…until the elevator opened and was empty.  This means that yet again, I have been ignored totally and they have hauled this huge piece of furniture out of the lobby and through the front doors in front of all of my neighbors.  Twice in one day.

So my question is this: why do I bother to even say anything at all? Or is it that it’s actually in English in my head and in Chinese when it comes out of my mouth??  This is unclear. Further experimentation to follow. Stay tuned…

http://jezebel.com/#!5774374/charlie-sheens-history-of-violence-toward-women

I have only wanted to quit this badly once before, and that was when my board chair disrespected me so badly that I literally could not speak to her for a month.  I had the most delightful conversation today with two women who make promotional films for non-profits.  They were so interested and engaged in what we do, and so inspired by our work.  And while I was talking to those two women and slogging through my day, 27 women got help at our organization.  And all I can see is months of files, receipts, reports, and bullshit.  I really just need to quit. This job ate my life, and it’s now in the process of eating my soul.  And I’m allowing it to happen.

The afternoon was topped off with a crack from the same person about our new landlord who has been a pushy pain in the ass. He showed up to sign the lease and wanted cash for a lease that had not been fully executed. I said no.  We gave him a check, got a signed lease, and he left.  Ms. Married With Children’s commentary on the situation: “I didn’t feel comfortable giving him cash either; although he is married with kids so it’s not like he was likely to rip us off.”  I took a deep breath and walked away before I blew a gasket.  In fact, I got so angry that I didn’t really have to bite my tongue. Nothing verbal was happening in my brain.

So to sum up yesterday’s lessons about married and childed life vs. singledom: single people have absolutely nothing to worry about at all, living an hour’s commute away from your job is a sign of frivolity, and we are far more likely to be dishonest and rip people off.  Got it!  Thanks for clearing that up.