The delicate art of getting a grip

When you've had a lot going on, when you've been off-balance, struggling with depression or other emotional issues, when you've had your focus firmly on one goal or one area of life, it can be hard to keep up with commitments.  I've neglected this blog for months; I've been focussed elsewhere, and I've been dealing with what we know these days as Stuff.

It's all pretty complicated and I'm not sure I'm up to giving a detailed account.  I met someone, got on really well with them, and thought I'd found a new friend.  When they hesitantly and awkwardly almost-asked-me-out a couple of months ago I'm ashamed to say missed the hints, and then I realised, and did my own asking (like a grown-up!).  But they couldn't manage the date I suggested, and then things went off the boil slightly as I was about to go away for a fortnight's holiday.  Just after I got back from my trip, this person had some private issues from their past come boiling up into the present, and within a couple of weeks had stopped speaking to me completely, and unfriended me on facebook.  And I have very little idea of why.

I am confused, hurt and angry; and I'm also not a little worried for my sometime-friend, who is acting out of character.  But since they won't speak to me and have ignored my email, I don't know what else I can do.  As the cliché has it, some people come into your life for a reason, and some just for a season.  Maybe this was one of those relationships. 

I hate not understanding what went wrong, and I hate the feeling that my trust may have been ill-placed.  I don't trust people quickly these days, but this friendship had won my trust, and now I wonder if I was completely mistaken.

Heavens, I don't think "yes, I'd go out with you on a date, I really like you!" quickly these days, either.

I'll still be here if they do decide to talk to me at some point.  Although the private issues I mentioned were unpleasantly messy and reflected less-than-well on them, my instinct is that my friend is not a monster, just a normal fucked-up human being with a mess they need to deal with.  I know that feeling.  So yes, I'll still be here.  But I won't pursue.  They're an adult, if they want me they can come and find me; they know where I can be found.

The really interesting thing about this relationship (to be thoroughly cynical and self-absorbed) has been the amount I've got out of it, and in such a short time, too.  This person could be pretty bracing company; outspoken, determined, challenging, even aggressive at times, and absolutely committed to walking their talk.  I had to shake myself out of a lot of familiar patterns, in order just to keep up.  It was bracing, but by damn, it did me good.

I've been in quite a rut, the last few months, and battling with my old invidious enemy, depression.  There were weeks when my fencing class was the one bright spell; a couple of hours of focus and excitement and energy, in a life of day after day of grey fear, procrastination and numbed emotions.
This relationship shook me out of that, and whatever else, I am intensely grateful and glad of this.  Yes, I've been hurt, and baffled, and pissed-off, by this sudden inexplicable break.  But I have been blessed in the friendship nonetheless.

So now, in the aftermath of having someone I thought was walking with me turn round and walk away without a word of explanation, I'm looking again at my life and trying to get a grip on things.  I hope I can maintain the momentum of being braced and energised and shaken up.

There's been no luck on the conventional job front, so I've now definitely gone back to working as an artists' model for the time being.  I'm not sure if I'll manage to make ends meet, but if I don't try it, I won't ever know.  I'm registered as self-employed and got a DBS certificate (what used to be known as CRB >sigh< yet another silly name change), and I've begun picking up some bookings.

I'm also feeling a bit more creative flow, at long last.  I've had another little push at trying to get sales and reviews for "The Charcoal Knots"; and I've finished a sequel, which needs to come back from my beta readers and hopefully will then be published.  I'm working on the extended version of "Running away with Pausanias" and that's going well.  I'm working on some art again, and have finally got round to setting up a facebook page for my art work; you can find that here if you're interested.  I've brushed-up my proof-reading symbols and started learning how to do indexing, and will be looking for any small freelance jobs of that sort, too. 

So, this is me right now; disappointed in love and friendship, but getting a grip and hoping to make a living as a freelancer.  Hoping that creativity and art can gain from the boost in my energy and the jolt in my life.  Still writing, still drawing, and of course still fencing.

Wish me luck.

Massive blues today

I had a job interview yesterday; it went fairly well, there were no really ghastly or tough questions and everyone was friendly.  But afterwards as I was coming away, I found myself puzzling, because instead of feeling pretty cheerful about it as I would have expected, I felt really flattened.

I'd been completely in "interview mode", just fixed on giving it my best shot, remembering all the things you need to remember at an interview, all the nuances, all the subtle things about choice of words, tone of voice and so on.  I went through the whole thing working hard to keep as focussed as possible and perform to my very best.  But slowly as it went on I found myself starting to feel oddly uncomfortable. 

I couldn't pin it down for a while, and I wasn't really able to step back mentally and think "Why doesn't this feel right?" until it was over.  It took me some time to sort out why I wasn't happy, because I needed to get right out of that mental space again and look at things more coolly; and so I was a good deal of the way home before I had the first ah-ha moment.  Then gradually as I thought things through I began to see what had been so jarring. 

It would take forever to explain all the little signs I managed to put together; but basically I realised that over the course of the interview there had been a growing number of signs that the role wasn't quite what I'd thought. 

I'd got the idea, from the job description and person specification, that it was a role doing a lot of the things I used to do at Kew, at the level I used to be at, and I know I have the skills and experience for that sort of work.  But it turned out to be a different, rather lower-grade job, a basic admin support for two people at the level I used to be at; not only less well-paid but also markedly less responsible, and only using a small proportion of my core skills regularly.

I'm not quite sure how, but I had misread the job information as saying what I wanted it to say.  And I'm not sure how, but it would seem the employers had misread my application in the same way.

I'm not terribly career-minded; I don't feel slighted at the prospect of not being employed at the same grade I used to be on.  But I am concerned that this job might turn out to be a lot less interesting than the description made it sound, and a lot less involving for me.  I probably wouldn't have applied if I'd cottoned-on that it was an office junior role, rather than a front-facing customer-focussed sales role.  I'm trying to go after jobs that require my core skills, which are heavily based in customer-service, not general basic admin. 

It was a rather peculiar experience altogether.  I can analyse it till the cows come home (believe me, I'm over-analysing for England right now) but working out how this maybe happened isn't helping as much or as quickly as I'd like.  I just feel so inept, and terribly deflated; it's really depressed me to have made such a basic error of judgement.

 

I hope I don't get offered it now, because I really won't want to accept it if I am. And that thought feels pretty bleak. 

Damn it, something has to come up at some point.  Something has to.

But feeling so low and blue today has left me fighting, suddenly right on the edge of a bout of depression.  Damn it all to hell, I don't want to go there. 

Quick catch-up...

It hasn't been a particuarly easy few months, since I got back from Greece.  I began serious job-hunting in October, but without success as yet.  I've been depressed at how little there is out there that is both interesting and worthwhile, that would also still pay me enough.  I've found jobs that pay okay, but are either dire, or involving skills or experience I don't have; and I've found jobs that sounded great, but were only part-time or temporary, or only paid peanuts.  But the intersection of "This sounds like a good job" with "I can do all those things" and "I could live on that salary" has proved dismally elusive.

And I'm not looking for a large salary, by the way!  My core skill set, after all, is in customer service, a field we undervalue badly, and given that, I know it's unrealistic to set my hopes high.  But I'd like to earn enough to live on. 

I finally have an interview on Monday, anyway, so that's a start.  It's a job at Richmond Theatre, which would be great - and getting it would mean I was joining ATG, which could also be great.  So cross fingers for me.  It'll be good interview experience, anyway.

Meanwhile, my back-up plan was to do lots of writing while I was out of work.  But I've been struggling with that; indeed, a lot of the time I've been completely blocked.  It's nightmarish when that happens, but I've been there before and I know that all I can do is soldier on and get through it; it always does end, eventually, so it's the soldiering-on that I have to focus on.  Just recently, the last couple of weeks, there've been signs of a breakthrough on that front, which is fantastic.  I've been re-reading some of the stuff I've written in the last few years and have been pleased to find much of it is better than I remembered.  I'm working on some re-writes and using that to coax the Muse into coming back for a longer stay.

What other news?  I turned fifty in December, shock horror.  Luckily the birthday itself was fine, but the number is a bit shocking just the same. 

I've lost 25% of my body weight since last March, though, and have now stabilised at just over 12 stone (12 stone 1lb - I can't seem to shift that last little scrap!), and I feel healthier physically than I have done in years.  The doctor has even taken me off the diabetes medication for a trial period, to see how I get on with managing the condition just through diet and exercise. 

I took a touch-typing course, and am working rather slowly at trying to improve my speed and accuracy.  I'm not great yet, but I'm getting there.  Slowly slowly, as my Nana used to say. 

I've also taken up fencing.  The sport, not the garden skill.  I just finished a beginners' foil course and tonight is my first-ever time with the main club practice session.  The idea of walking in this evening and just looking for someone who'll fence a few hits with me is frankly bloody intimidating.  But I've started buying the kit, so I really can't back out now.  It's tremendous fun, anyway; I'd hate to stop.  I never thought I'd find a sport I enjoyed this much - never been a sporty type at all...

Otherwise, not much is going on.  Need to get on with the writing and find a new job.  End of update.  Ciao!