Despair

We're coming up on four months of being unemployed (and by we I mean I). It's monumental, signifying my longest period of unemployment since I was about 16, and simultaneously the lowest my savings account has been since those adolescent days. I normally try to abstain from writing anything on here that necessitates the "gripes" label, but as the title of this entry very subtly suggests, despair is beginning to set in.

I left a good job to come down here. In all fairness, it wasn't my dream job, but then again, whose is? I liked the people I worked with, the hours weren't awful, and the pay (for Michigan especially) was beyond decent. But my problem is that I'm a romantic (which you can read all about here), and I did probably the most impulsive thing I've ever done by simply packing up all my belongings and moving to another state.

But even at my most impulsive, I was still very kind to my employer. I gave more than apt notice of my impending departure, did everything I could to make the transitional period an easy one, and worked up to the day before I was scheduled to pick up the U-Haul. Similarly, my apartment complex, who had pretty much treated me like they were doing me a favor by letting me live there, got the royal treatment as well. Unit 305 was by far cleaner the day I left than the day I moved in.

In terms of job placement, I was on the ball as well. I'd been applying in south Florida for months prior to the actual move. No bites, but still. Within two weeks of my arrival down here, I actually had two interviews scheduled, both of which were in libraries (the market I'm trying to break into). I didn't get either job, obviously, but the frequency of the interviews seemed promising. Then things died down a bit. It was as if those first two interviewers had told all other potential employers that I have some kind of debilitating social condition.

Then came my stint as a temp. The only thing I have to say about this is that never, in the course of completion of my four year degree, was I taught the proper way to stock a refrigerator with sodas. I'm not above this sort of work, but like warm Pepsi, it certainly left a bad taste in my mouth.

Now I sit and apply. For everything. Horrified by a good amount of the job descriptions, I apply in the hopes that I get that call. I don't dream anymore that moving down here for love might somehow coincide with my finding true happiness in a career. My fantasy has become making my June car payment. It's a strange kind of regression. I mean, really, what happens when your fantasy is something you've already done?

But I guess it's not all bad. I have a very understanding would-be-fiancée, a very nice desk at which I can sit and write cover letters, and two very uppity cats that seem to require 24-hour supervision anyway. I have plenty of time left in the day to make stupid videos and write screenplays. I have this lovely blog that is perhaps helping me to shoot myself in the foot, should hiring managers be Googling my name on the open web. Yes, it could always be worse, but still, being knee-deep isn't any kind of picnic.

Man. Writing when your depressed is like going to the grocery store when you're starving. Stay tuned for something quasi-optimistic.