Caterwauling

I saw that Amex is laying off 5,400 people. Pity that people who worked hard and did what was asked of them and probably even exceeded expectations are at the mercy of people paid two to six times as much didn’t make the best decisions available to them and now their livelihood is affected.

Blame Obama all you want for not creating jobs fast enough. The man can’t come into every individual company and tell them what they’re doing wrong and to STOP DOING IT.

Perhaps I should stop my speaking moratorium with God to ask that everyone whose hearts are hurting and checkbooks are suffering gets some peace tonight, and MUCH brighter days ahead.

I haven’t talked to God in a really long time. I’ve tried — my “God time” was always during my 45-minute commute, which is quickly becoming my favorite part of my job. But after a few weeks of silence, now I have a difficult time speaking to Him without yelling right now. In my mind AND aloud.

I just noticed that I haven’t written in my (daily) gratitude journal since Dec. 29. Coincidence?

Today, I was thinking about how I cling to the hope that God really CAN change things overnight. Mom’s health, for example. Everything else that’s not quite right. But after some ch-ch-changes at work, I was wondering whether He could CHANGE THEM BACK. And quickly.

Of course, the way I figure, if He got me into this, He can get me out of it. Better off than I was before, too.

Who knew that my New Year’s resolution to “fail absolutely everybody” would come true so quickly? Do I win a prize?

It’s going to get harder before it gets better. Much harder. Everyone says what is being asked of me is impossible for any one human to handle. It’s not even that I want to prove anyone right (for believing in me) or wrong (because let’s face it, the odds are in their favor). It’s that I want to feel good and healthy and happy for a change and even if this isn’t the direct path, I have to believe it will get me there somehow.

Do you ever get cut off on the highway by some asshole who can’t find his blinker, and THEN he turns it on after he’s almost clipped off your front end?

That asshole is probably a decision-maker at a company somewhere. Flip him off on behalf of all the drones whose nervous conditions are created/heightened by his ill-planned-out actions.

The last time I went through a full re-org (not counting my time at a company where the CEO re-orged monthly), I ended up in Florida.

Hmm. …

My New Year’s resolutions, assuming I don’t drop dead from an anxiety attack from work, are:

1. Go to Europe. Even if it’s on Dec. 31, 2013, I am getting out of the country. Hell, high water, or both.

2. Move. I just got my “here’s what your new rent will be” notice. I could take on a car payment if I got out of this hole. And since I came home last night to a smattering of fire trucks, ambulances and cop cars after some nitwit blew himself up trying to shoot fireworks off the roof, I know it’s time. I will miss seeing the ocean every day of my life, but if I can save about $500 a month to move on the other side of the Intracoastal, I’m doing it. The only thing holding me back is Mom’s anxiety. But mine has to trump hers this time.

3. Buy a new car. Again, even if it’s Dec. 31. While I love having the first world problem of having two cars and having to live out of both, it’s time to own something reliable again.

4. Preserve my mental health. The way things are going, my life is going to be the death of me. I always sniffed at people who worked the 9-to-5 shift, and I sure as hell will never be able to. But I’m going to take my vacation time and do the best I can to not kill myself for people who can replace me without batting an eye. I want to achieve great things but I am not going to an early grave for these people, either. Even though that’s where I’m heading. So if I can trim the 8-to-8 life down to about 8-to-6, we’ll call it a victorious year.

5. Love myself. Nothing more needs to be said about that.

I had just emerged from my last meeting of the day yesterday when I decided to fire up Faceypages before starting the evening shift.

A photo that I had posted on the drive to work — and I was running 45 minutes late, mind you — was timestamped “posted 11 hours ago.”

And I don’t think I’ve ever been so annoyed in my life.

So basically a photo I’d posted around 7 a.m. was now taunting me that it was nearing the other 7 o’clock and I’d accomplished next to nothing.

I went home, by the way. It was a really mentally tough day. I had nothing left to give. And here at 7-ish a.m. today, I still don’t. But oh well.

Look, I have no problem with my 12-ish hour days and my 90 minutes or so in the car. But we’re in the middle of a Chinese fire drill where we’re all learning new jobs and many, like me, are simply taking on five other people’s jobs while mostly keeping the same one that already exceeded 40 hours.

My 12-ish hour jaunts were fine because they were steady-busy. Now I’m learning and I’m sitting in meetings up to four hours a day and I don’t know how much longer I can sustain this pace. Two days into the new year and I’m already broken.

I still see everyone skipping out at 5. And it just makes me mad that I work so hard and care so much and I’m feeling so goddamned guilty that I can’t make it partway through my to-do list and now I have to inconvenience everyone on the planet today because I’m buried under new and old work and I can’t even do the old work on time because I’m struggling to understand the new expectations … which I have to learn RIGHT NOW because apparently life depends on it.

Life, revenue … same thing.

I don’t know how it will all get done. But it will.

Haven’t written in my gratitude journal in days, so today I’ll make it more of a wish — I am grateful for everyone who helps me, and for all the friends who keep asking me for stuff to practice patience or maybe even a little creative problem-solving of their own, and for everyone whose job I am taking so I can show folks how shit REALLY gets done.

“You throw your head back laughing like a little kid
I think it’s strange that you think I’m funny cause he never did.”

*cough cough Topo Gigio cough*

“I’ve been spending the last eight months
Thinking all love ever does is break and burn and end.”

*cough Topo cough Gigio cough*

“But on a Wednesday in a cafe, I watched it begin again.”

— Taylor Swift, “Begin Again”

More like a random Tuesday after I threw the workday into the Fuck-It Bucket a little earlier than usual. But still.

And maybe it’s all an illusion, but I deserve some time in Wonderland after what happened eight months ago.

“We walked down the block to my car
And I almost brought him up
But you start to talk about the movies that your family watches
Every single Christmas
And I won’t talk about that
And for the first time
What’s past is past.”

And good riddance. To 2012 and all the fear and sadness and bewilderment and continual “I want you — I reject you — wait, where are you going — come back but don’t get too close” bullshit.

Lucky ’13. Show me what you’ve got. I’m going all in. And ’12 — and everyone in it and in-between — can GTFO.