I sit here crying and it's pathetic. I'm nearly 40 and I'm crying in bed because I didn't get a job.
This isn't any special job. It isn't my "dream job". It's your run of the mill crappy ass minimum wage job here in LA. It's a job that patted itself on the back for offering $16 an hour. For LA, that's barely scraping by but I guess you can say that it's a decent paying job. But I am 40! I should be making more that $16 an hour.
This job was ridiculous. "There may be raises, but that just depends", is what I was told. It was a BOH job for a retailer. So, the only perk was you didn't have to work directly with customers.
I knew this job would suck. I knew if I took this job the moment that I started it I would be on the hunt for another job. They were offering 40 hours a week, which was nice. It was 8 to 5, which was also nice. But the days off were split. Who does that?
So I sit here crying about not getting this job. Why?
These past 3 years here in LA have been rough. The jobs and the market have sucked. Or more specially they've sucked for individuals like myself, the lost and wandering at life. We just don't know what we want to be when we grow up. I just need a job, the kind that is okay enough that I don't want to kill myself every night.
Why am I having this fucking midlife crisis?
I feel like I missed something in adulthood. I missed the memo about how to go about getting jobs, finding jobs, liking jobs and staying at jobs.
I think that it doesn't help that I started out in the food service industry. Maybe that is where I failed at the beginning of it all. When your young you don't realize it at first. Hell, we have networks dedicated to cooking and food. There are blogs coming out of our asses about food and recipes. Where did I go wrong.
I do pastry and I loved it until I didn't.
Kitchen/bakery work is hard and extremely low paying. But those TV shows don't show you that. At a certain point the job becomes to much physically. It's a weird feeling lasting as long as I did in kitchens, especially if you don't take the management tract. You end up being managed by young twenty-somethings, which for myself I didn't mind, but you end up having to be the employee that is breaking in a new management teams time and time again and it's exhausting. You become a babysitter. But you stick it out because you love baking.
By the time you hit my age, most of the people that you ended up coming up with in kitchens are already out. For me, getting out has been the hardest thing ever.
When you start to look for a new job you begin to question everything about yourself. Especially if you haven't taken a specific tract for job growth. For people like me, who really don't know what they what to do when they grow up, they just need a job. But you can't tell that to anyone you're applying to. I just need a fucking job.
This is where the sad reality comes in. I spend my time crusin' the postings on Indeed, looking at jobs I know I can do, but after numerous failed interviews you begin to question your ability to function as an adult. It's not that hard to train someone in. I can answer your multi line phone system, but heaven forbid I haven't been working on one for five years. I think I can figure that out.
Right now I'm looking at admin jobs, but because I've spent most of my time in kitchens most places I apply too just assume I can't work in an office. Because I guess that's how it works, kitchen jobs = no other skills that can translate into other jobs.
I have made it to 40 by paying my bills, running a household, getting my lunch, answering the phone, greeting people, and traveling some of the world. I am a smart and capable adult. I too can do that for you. I know how to answer the phone and use the computer. Am I an expert on Excel? Fuck no, but I can learn how to use it quickly. Google is a pretty amazing thing. Do I have 3 to 5 years experience? No but again, I am capable of learning. I am not some house plant that can't learn.
I want to point out that the person you are looking for in that job listing wouldn't take your job for $15 an hour. Ugh. Don't get me started on these job descriptions and the pay. Your insane job posting that is the length of a novella expects me to do all these things for $15 or less with at least 5 years experience. We live in Los Angeles! You got to be kidding me.
But here I am crying after I didn't get one of these jobs. Low pay, split days off, a uniform, and employees that will all be in there 20's where I will be 40 in a few months.
This is my life. This is where I'm at. One crappy job after another. I went from the kitchen, to who knows whats next. Trying to pivot my "career" is like trying to convince people that I too can do brain surgery. But really, should I just take anything to get out? Continue this cycle of crappy jobs? Am I the only one in this cycle of hell? Am I being dramatic? Probably.
XO
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