Career Workshop Sutra

It's the morning. I don't feel that guilt I get before sleep, that hopeless, cope-less inadequacy and confusion. Righteous anger returns, ratchets up the blood pressure, but my system can take it, so far, clots so far downstream. Anger's better than nocturnal dread, what I call "bond with Blank", what I feel when I'm too tired to do anything but lie in bed hoping sleep comes soon, because I don't want to be a conscious zombie under trazodone sedation, and I'm a thirty-three-year-old babe in the woods. EXGF association. It's eerie how that bond with blank more than anything else is the resonance of a relationship, how once upon a time, she articulated a feeling I thought was so personal no one would ever understand, and despite our chronic communication failure, she worded this feeling, out of the black, in such a way as I knew without a doubt she'd had the same subtle feeling I'd never even thought to verbalize. It's one of those cruel ironies, the thing that made me feel closer to her than anything is apparently just a product of emotionations locked inside the wetware, fall apart without me, body. I even mentioned the "bond" in a letter to her, thinking I was being really expressiony, almost romantic, maybe, but I never heard back. Well, whatyagonna do? Share the sacred nocturne with self in moments of weakness that will rhyme because memories are based on what you thought back on most often in annoyingly repetitive redundancy.

This guy is putting his resume up on the projector for public scrutiny. I gotta respect the humility. He deserves to be a working janitor more than I do. He even used that word, rather than "custodian" or "cleaner". But fuck me if I'm gonna share my pathetic resume or ridiculous career aspirations with anyone, let alone everyone. Gonna stay closed, oh yeah. Workshop participant critiques of workshop participant resumes is just as aggravating as I would have imagined. Absolutely everything that can annoy and depress me... will. Good thing he doesn’t feel my subjective neuroses. Good thing I'm neither exhibiting nor critiquing a resume, lest I get shot down in any way for any reason.

Still so hard dealing with these people. 289 flavours of awhwhkckwhard ness! A real nerd, who is not suddenly revealed to be sexy when the glasses are removed. He's still, sadly, a nerd. He's not happy to be one. Not proud. Neither is she. Yes, even her, even though she's of the sex that makes her a desirable human in the eye of this beholder, flaws rendered passable, even adorable in a weird sort of way, blotchy skin not such a big deal cause she's got that feminine form, a nice figure and a fine face, but even she is a real nerd, the sad kind, despite how clueless I am that she doesn't have it made, being desirable to me, can't she see? Perhaps I should go fuck myself with a VR avatar, post-modern information age nanotech superbot ouroboros coitus.

Hiring practices... Discrimination based on religion is mentioned. Tangent opportunity! Our resident juvenihilist springs into action like he was waiting all workshop to introduce us to the wicked satire of the Pastafarians and their mock deity: the Flying Spaghetti Monster, atheism at a grade nine level. The "bit of a socialist" guy gets flak for them not seeing any volunteer positions on his resume. Ouch. Disgustingly cute: the participant trying to be facilitator. Some guy's misinforming the crowd about PDFs. I won't deign to correct. Is he an adobe shill? "Adohbee". Exaggerated vowels, what Americans think Canadians sound like, local folk happy to validate stereotypes.

This is the Kootenays, someone says for some reason. This is the "Keet-nees" cud-chewing dopey cali dialect, bent, canuckisized, fair-traded. "Trimming bud". Is a funny thing to mention while we're on the subject of jobs. At this job workshop. Ahaha, how hilarious, another bud-related bon-mot. And see if you can work in a reference to Shambhala. Seeeper Keet-nee enunciator takin' his sreeet time, seeeper sreeet, beakin' off about how he got burnt out and qruit that time, campin' out in chesty vowels, mashin' those words to mush, making it impossible to think of anything else, seeeeeeper confident in conveying what precisely he doesn't know, for your perusal. Pause for laughter. Nice. "You're so Kootenay dude", someone says. And a reference to Starbelly, could you at least say Starbelly Jam to make it a little less nicknamey? Everybody perks up at Starbelly. Perk perk perk. It's fun to think about, when you're at a work workshop, cause it's a music festival. Something to talk about. And rig-pigs, and Fort Mac.

Now I'm treated to people opining about movies. Smooth how he worked in the phrase "anti-septic" to describe 2001, so slick, like he tosses around such qualifiers as a matter of course, when pontificating on the nuances of sci-fi filmography. "It wasn't anti-septic to me", the other guy says.

The mere mention of Kalesnikov Lumber is like a dagger in my heart. No, that's too romantic a metaphor. More like a catheter in my dick. Oh, they do six hour interviews there? And they don't let you know that beforehand, so it's just, oh, by the way, there's more courses to this thing than a twelve star restaurant. Well then... And somebody mentions that he thinks they pay 20$ an hour. Don't know why, but I loathe this piece of information. Fuck, gotta leave, soon. This isn't gonna get any better. People're gonna keep piping up. I'm gonna keep hating it.

Oh look, the Keets keener keeps opining, on anything and everything. Fun facts about The Royal and liquor licenses. It's objectively funny to mention how they're legally prohibited from letting their patrons dance, but hearing this mentioned is like a catheter in my dick. Here we go on a tangent again. |________| Maybe I can bail before they make us marionette ourselves in mock interviews.

Grabbed a carrot stick from the snack table to crunch on, a loud protest to vent frustration passive-aggressively when they veer off topic into grandstanding horseshit. It's the carrot AND the stick. Oh lookey here, ol' Keet-nee Ale wants to LOOK his theoretical applicants in the EYE cause he thinks he's a poker master and can always tell everyone's tells... Cause no one could ever suppress feelings in person! Here's my tell, here's a pattern you can factor into your trenchant analysis: Every time I take a bite off this oversized carrot stick, I'm praying for lesions on your vocal cords and cancer in your throat. When I ease up on the chewing, you'll notice that the facilitator has resumed talking which is what I came here to listen to.

Funny how quick he was to say he has indeed been on the other side, as the interview-er. Immediate, nay, pre-mediate "I have" when she asked if anyone had been on said other side. "That's what I'd say, if I were an interviewer". Lieutenant Laptop to the rescue. Keet-nee Ale is talking at every opportunity now. He's creating opportunities, cultivated image like fecal decals. Enough of your yapping, Keets Keener. You ain't been deputized for sheeyit.

The guy from Kal Tire does indeed want to know why people want to peel tires. That's a hiring tactic. Note to self: at job interviews, take time to repeat questions to self in own words while thinking of an answer... I guess I am absorbing stuff. Some good info, but at what price? The price of enduring deep chesty voiced keener confidence chatter. Shut up about "flipping". Flipping you know what. I'm gonna fucking flip out. McDs has a burger university, does it? Didn't need to know that. These cliches need to retire to the sunshine state with steak 'n lobsters, bluey skyes, blood diamonds, and brewskies.

Also, I don't wanna know what you have the "ability to" do... but then, we have such use, such a rich full spectrum of use for idiots to fill... the empty... spaces... where we... used... to talk. Okay public audience, occupy the whole headspace. Trillian dollar cadence - GDP cadence - domestic cadence - fireside cadence pretense credential torrent Top 40. What can I offer that a billion red Chinese can't? Some artistic statement on telephone sanitation? Ted Talks are for six figure crackas... and why wouldn't they be? The Cyborg Imperium are the designers aren't they? Most of them are schlockmeisters as well. Some of them write software for reading resumes in bulk. It badly needs debugging. They call them crawlers. How lame. Can we get some walkers? And no, of course you can't read me, I'm encrypted. Stop trying, if there's anything you need to know, I'll tell you.

Bowing, scraping, supplicating to the labour market. Abandon all dignity, all y'all that enter here. Why is it an endurance test every time I do something like this, that's supposed to be good for me? Marveling at my rawness of nerves. Between the smokes and supplements, haven't I got the nicotine covered? Case in point: a new person's resume. They say "quite a diverse skill set". Clench. Don't wanna know. Don't wanna compare. Don't wanna think about your targeted resume for a heli-skiing company. Company. Don't want to hear ___ makes 700 dollars a day, and underwater welders can make four hundred thousand in a few months. Gol-lee, that sure is a lot of money, I agree. Honestly, I don't know what's wrong with me.

The mere mention of the show Family Guy in no particular context draws a laugh. That guy's trying to be funny again. Funny how I wanted the aspiring comedian to bomb... then when he does, I want to defend him, cause that was the one half-decent bit of wit he came up with, not that I would undertake to laugh and validate the attempt. Judging judging judging. I judge, you judge. I justify paranoia at the mental gymnasium. God help me if they do as I do.

I love to say I hate office politics.... as if it sets me apart. Who ever says they like office politics? Where are the self-identified drama queens? That's why I like the Tyrion character from Game of Thrones. He accepts the mantle, he loves the game. We need someone like that, so we can feel superior setting ourselves apart from the game everybody plays but cannot be thought to enjoy playing. Each and every one of us is special, and especially susceptible to ordinary applications of certain brands of sarcasm. Sarcasm's my brand, it's not profitable, cause I'm a non-profit, it gets me just shy of nowhere, but it's a fallback lounge, the perpetual green room pre-debebauch for post-doctoral retires. No one can take my notes away from me.

Haha, they trot out the made-up statistic about how 93% of communication is non-verbal. Yes, if you're "measuring" non-informative delusional extrapolations. Uh oh, "How you're presenting yourself...", here we go. Fruck (just to be diff'rent [sic]). I know smirking is obnoxious - oh, my mirror is gleaming fluorescent screaming contempt back to me, but if you can't handle a smirk, don't ask for a smile. How 'bout a glare? I'm really trying not to sneer and cringe... I'm just failing a lot.

Man, this ain't a good start, 20 mins in, barely hanging on, clenched like a dental patient taking the slow drill, nerves raw as Portland pretense. It's nothing new though, just acute today. Can't deal with voices, colloquialisms, dialects, life... yes, life. I'm sure almost any of these fine people would have sage life lessons for me right now, like, to take it as it comes, live on its terms, etc. From the vantage of facile maturity.

What's worrying is that it gets worse and worse, it's such an untenable trend. Wish I could be okay with people being themselves. Is that a crumb of hope, the mere existence of that wish? The fact that I'm dissatisfied with taking what comfort I can in spite? I can't possibly be keeping my anger to myself, can I? Should I stay or would that do more harm than simply bailing, if I'm just vibing everyone out?

Whew... Calm down. Take a huff of air. Write a one word sentence and place a period. Regroup. Sweet smell of photocopier and love for how the acronym O.S. rolls off the tongue and makes me think of windows and linux and the comforting minutia of software environments and global hotkeys. Perhaps this is my element more than I even know. Let others ask the dumb questions I don't want to. Thanks others. I'll smile to myself when the one lady steals the others' thunder. I loafs it! Yis b'y.

Crisis precipitates change. I need someone to express their suffering, to shame me. But not so much so that I feel stymied and squirm in impotence and incompetence. Best thing would be someone betraying being a loser. I need someone to pull some brilliant balls-out loser maneuver, some petty thing, and also to be aware of it, to feel the full force of their own sad stupidity, to be a lovable pitiable loser. Then I can rise to the compassionate occasion, balance the equation with informed empathy. Yeah.