My Watch Says Half-Past "Put Up", Rapidly Approaching "Shut Up"

So, what the hell was that all about?

When I began this blog last year, the central point of the thing was how to go about launching a screenwriting career while working at a daygig that was pretty demanding. I couldn't have known then that 'pretty demanding' was going to smash-cut into 'all-consuming'. You know about the long hours, the last-minute-shifting schedule. These were elements of the job that were to be tolerated if I was going to get to do the part of the job I was happy with. In the end, these elements merged with a new force, a change in the people my company was typically targeting to occupy my position.

Previously, there was a place in my company within store management for the technically-minded. I was the regular Joe manager, the guy who'd worked his way up from sales associate. Having that sort of history always garnered surprise and awe from managers from other stores, they knew it was not the norm, either in retail or with my company. I even had my eyes set last year on going further, hoping to take the last step before the store manager title into a senior assistant title. It was too much to hope for, I found, as not only did the job require intense (and pointless...it was almost never a predictor of what would happen next) analysis of sales data on a daily basis, but the decision was made by the regional director to hire for that position only store-manager level candidates from other retailers and demote them rather than promote from within. There was only one example of a store manager who'd worked up from an associate position, and he was in a small market thousands of miles away and has since dropped from the company rolls. I was in the largest-expanding market in the company and they were aggressively searching for those who are ready RIGHT NOW. I wasn't ready, and when my boss and I had progressively-worsening conversations about whether I wanted to get there, I found through my schedule and assigned responsibilities that I was being marginalized and shut out.

In the Age of Litigation, the effective manager is one who can convince the employee that hard work does not always equal a job well done so that when that employee is pushed out, there's no impetus to sue. I was castigated on a daily basis, every move questioned and re-questioned. One of my superiors slipped one day and told me how in her last job she was adept at "working people out of the system", and she drew very quiet when I asked her how that was performed, knowing I now knew her role in what was being done with me. Tasks were arbitrarily added to and removed from my responsibilities and the time previously scheduled to perform them was reduced or cancelled on the fly so I never had solid footing on what I'd be doing one day to the next. I grew depressed, a condition not helped by spending most every night at work and talking to my wife more on the phone than in person.

So, the last six weeks or so have been spent searching for a new job, and last Friday I found one, a good one with room to grow within a very, very successful (did I mention very) advertising/PR conglomerate as an IT tech. I accepted the new job Friday night at 7 pm and walked into the old job Saturday morning at 9:45 to resign.

The stress hasn't all run off yet. Since the new job starts so soon, I didn't get to say goodbye to everyone, so there's a little guilt. There's the anxiety of a new job, new people. A new commute, not knowing yet whether the vagaries of the MTA will play in my favor.

But, no more late night paint jobs, no more closing shift/opening shift combos, no more monthlong stretches where I'm scheduled to work until 10 pm every night while my single and/or child-free colleagues enjoy the 8-5 shift. No more angst about whether I'm any good at the job I don't want, no more weekends spent at work while my wife and son go off to enjoy the company of friends. A quick glance at my May schedule shows me at the store after 9 pm fifteen times out of a possible twenty-two days of work. After I quit and spoke to my boss briefly Saturday morning, I drove home in the daylight feeling like I was playing hooky. I sat at home by myself on a Saturday morning reading a magazine. Later that afternoon, I took a drive with the family to an impromptu barbeque. Not a major barbeque requiring requesting off weeks or even months in advance, but a "hey, come on over, beers and burgers" barbeque with friends. I watched The Prince run off to play with kids who'd somehow grown to twice their remembered size. I cracked open a Sam Adams, helped The Prince climb onto the swing set, listened to my wife laugh on the other side of the yard.

The next move is to set myself a daily/weekly schedule, when I'll be working, when I'll be spending family time, when I'll be writing. Then I'll be pushing.

Because if I can't do it now that my old reasons for not being able to get it done are gone, it'll be easier to just do it than to come up with new reasons.