On my way to the bus stop today, completely ignorant of the time and assuming that I was running late, I was just in sight of the bus stop as I saw it pull up. Fearing that I would miss it, I broke into a run. He waited, though not for me, for someone else he saw running. This made me feel less badly when I instantly realized that I was on the wrong bus. This one was half the size of the one I normally took. Looking around, knowing the truth, there was nothing I could but ask the bus driver “I’m on the wrong bus, aren’t I?”   

I typically think of city bus drivers as jaded and mean. Once, trying to use my Taps card on a bus that apparently only took cash, I got looked at like I was retarded and made to get off cause I didn’t have a dollar with me. (That’s the bus I get to ride home today).

However, this driver was very nice. I guess it helps that I look and sound like a teenager. More than once that’s helped me in situations where a grown woman should have known better. 35 years working this job, and he says he’s a people person. Told me my options, even gave me a transfer. I suffer from Social Anxiety, but he was nice enough to me that I felt obligated to talk with him for a couple stops until a seat opened up. It was tough, I hope I did it well enough.

So I’m heading to work, on an unfamiliar route, trusting what the driver said to get me where I’m going. Worried.

Speaking of work. The job is fine. I do more than double the output of everyone else. This is nothing new to me. Every job I’ve ever worked has been this way. Although, it’d be great if they could stop using me as their poster child, trying making the others in my position shamed into doing more. Sending out emails every few hours with my name at the top if the list.

As I was walking to my car yesterday (yes, I have one. I share it) there was a group from work doing the same. They brought up this fact, jokingly, and said “hi, welcome to the team. We hate you.” At least, I hope it was jokingly. I sometimes have trouble telling these things. It’s amazing, I can write dialogue fantastically (according to everyone who reads my writing), but when it comes to playing the part in person, I’m lost.

At work, I try to slack off like anyone else. I check my email, I surf the Internet, researching literary agents and what not, I’ve even blogged. I guess I’m just good at multitasking. I’m the kind who has accepted that no one does as much work as me, but I don’t understand how they do it.

Speaking of doing work. I had this horrific realization that its not just something I have to get through for a little while. It’s something I may very well have to do forever. Somewhere along the way, work became optional. I’ve never had much money, but I got laid off, and for a while unemployment and savings was about enough to sustain me. If you ever have the option to live a life if leisure I’d recommend it.

Perhaps this issue started as early as skipping so much school as a kid that i don’t even know how I passed the 7th grade or any of the subsequent years. Though I did, and with great grades. Once they threatened to hold me back due to my attendance. It was the first quarter of the year.

This is not the first time I’ve started a job after a long period of not having one. Thanks student loans. (Not really, they’re terrible). I just have to think back to the last occasion, when if was the same. Waking up, going to work every day, was just so hard. Somehow it turned into almost four years. Although, 2 years into it I got to work the evening shift, then work that position from home. It was so great! But alas, the economy, got laid off.

So I have to keep taking this job one day at a time. I think if I imagine doing it forever, I might just resign myself to a cardboard box or squatting in my parents basement for the rest of the foreseeable future. No thanks. I just have to focus on what comes next. A better job? Is there possibly a job that I might actually, sustainably like? But just as long of a shot, I will keep writing. I’ve always written because I love it. With time and production and a whole lot of effort, maybe it will become a career. That’s the dream.