Be careful what you ask for...

Well, I did it. I had 'the talk' at work. And I think, come March 1st, I will have begun my ascent from small business hell. I don't expect a clean break. I just have this problem with quitting a job and then staying away from it. [Matt can relate to this--remember Captain Cody's? I went in for you that same week, and then years later, after I graduated, I worked at their restaurant up the street. Patterns...]. As a matter of fact, I'm going back to work at the job I left to work at this one, which I never really officially left on paper, which, as a matter of interest, meant that my company email was active for the past four months and therefore four months of email requests had piled up, the more recent ones wearing their chagrin and disappointment in my lack of response in much more obvious ways. One particular email was very pretty, looked almost designed specifically for the occasion, and said in very sugary language 'if you can't do it, send this to someone who can'. I'm sorry Ms. So-and-so, I already have a full-time job that I can't keep up with the work at, so you'll be needing to wait.
One of the main problems with the job I left is the amount of hats I was forced to wear. I felt like Bartholomew Cubbins, my blog moniker once more taking grotesque form. It's one thing to do about three jobs (which is what I did at the former company--I know because having gone back, I noticed there are now three people doing what I was doing before), but I was doing more like 5 or 6 at this place, and none of them up to the standard I would prefer. One superior noted 'I think you're doing a great job' after I tried to explain that to him. The same superior was quoted as saying 'so at the end of the month we'll say that you are no longer employed full time with us' at a meeting less than one week later. That's how it goes, my friends.
But the title...The pleasant but scary thing is that I got (so far) exactly what I asked for. The current job is removing all trace of responsibility from me, but is open to me freelancing and offering my services on a paid hourly rate. No risk of exploitation there. And my former boss has described me as 'extremely valuable, and has basically given me a blank check on my involvement with them (for scheduling, not salary--I'm not ballsy enough to ask for that). So now, the real challenge is to construct a schedule from each that I am happy with, so I don't become the boy who quits all the time, and to find a way to have it be necessary to both companies so that I can maintain that high regard. I get nervous when I feel beholden to anyone, especially anyone who signs my checks. Not a good place. And so, depending on how the negotiations go, I may be in a very similar place to where I was four months ago, which would be fine, because I was happy there. Being back at a cushy desk job would also allow me to spend more time here, and couldn't we all do with that? Sweet dreams...

The Self-Actualization of Proverbs 19:3 and some autobiographical hugger-mugger...

Well, all's quiet on the Southern front. The dishes are washed, the finances have been examined if still thoroughly misunderstood and the wife is tucked in, ready for a relatively long night of bizarre dreams that she will remember and want to tell me about tomorrow evening. We are both thinking about quitting our jobs. If you're just tuning in, we both work for a children's acting company, a very young company, and yet one that surprisingly demands the same attention as a much older, more established parent-like company. It says obey, but enjoy. It warns prioritize, but pursue your own ends. It offers no end of anxiety and reckless debate, and yet celebrates encouragement and self-esteem. What we are fast becoming are husks, flaky and windriven. We have been shorn from our young lives together. We have been left out like chaff to be scattered in the stampeding realization of another's dreams. Countless children have grown fat and ruddy from our bloodwork, ravenous each new day as if no draught had yet been drawn, and for it we are bandaged with paychecks, and sutured with the occasional exclamation of gratitude. Perhaps the problem is within me, I think. Then I look about inside and realize, no that can't be--I'm completely empty.
Other days I just suck it up and pull another smile off another hanger, slap it on, and sing life.