It’s been quite a while since I last posted and so quite a lot has happened. I had a few posts in the works but never did anything about them. I’ve been strangely active, and by that I mean I’ve started to write again (not able to do nearly as much as I used to but I’m getting enough done to not feel so hollow about it.

So here’s an update on my life after the halfway mark for a Bachelors of Writing.

Someone thought I was Good Enough

I got the job that I was talking about before. I’ve been working there since early September and I just quit my other one last week. I went into the first training shift and thought “oh my god I can’t go back to being treated like sh*t after being treated so nicely” and so I handed my resignation in for the other job the following week (once I saw my manager).

It was a little strange when I got the email to say I was successful because I’d resigned myself to not getting it. I had a really good experience during the application process but I felt that I wasn’t really up to par with some of the others there. I was waiting for my partner out the front of Krispy Kreme (which actually was not and so he had been waiting for me in front of the actual Krispy Kreme) and I got the email in my spam. It started off with that whole “you know, we had a lot of great candidates” and so I ‘knew’ I’d been rejected and I wasn’t even sad about it. And then I saw that there was a training shift schedule and I was like “wait a moment… hold on… holy sh*t”.

I’ve just finished up my training shifts and get thrown out on my own (but not really) tomorrow for my first ‘real’ shift. I like it better than Job A already. There isn’t any bullying, no intense physical labour, no unrealistic expectations on what my body can do and great morale. I hope I do well and I hope I’m there for a while.

Brisbane Writer’s Festival

I did my two shifts at the BWF and it was one of the worst/best experiences of my life. It was a new experience for me and the people that run the festival are all really interesting and nice people. The hard part was that I was a Survey Assistant and most people just want to go to the festival without being bothered. Young people can sense you from a mile away and elderly people love to talk, which was actually one of my highlights. I had some really great, interesting and funny conversations with the older patrons. I was also impressed by their thoughts and beliefs. To be honest, I went in there thinking that most people who attended BWF were probably going to be a little bit ‘snobby’. ‘Snobby’ is a harsh word but I was very much thinking of literary elitists and the way some people talk in my tutorials. But alas, the open-mindedness and willingness to be challenged and learn new things was something that all of the people I surveyed had in common. I was so impressed. And then I was embarrassed that I went in there with such an assumption. I wasn’t raised very well and so I don’t have a great view of people in categories and people in general, and this was one of those moments where I realised that avoiding someone because I think they are a certain way has really limited what I can learn from other people.

The weather was dry and windy and I headed for a water fountain every ten minutes. I didn’t survey many people but apparently, that’s normal. Although the survey was a lot longer than it needed to be for something that stops people in the middle of the walkway, it did show how much BWF wanted to ensure that it can bring a little something to all of its guests in the future. They don’t know who to cater to if they don’t know who likes to go. Proper, constructive feedback is so important these days.

I Quit Job A, YAY

I actually don’t know if I’ve mentioned where I worked before and so I’m just going to continue to call it ‘Job A’.

I was sad to leave, but I couldn’t stay there anymore. Not for my emotional or my physical health. It was a second home that became a second hell really. To my surprise, however, they threw me a little ‘going away’ party. It was nice. I got flowers and cake and chocolates, but it was sad because not many people who I was actually close to were there. And that drove in how alienated I was starting to feel there. I didn’t really feel like I was leaving but when I looked at all of the places where I have thousands of memories of, and I realised I can’t go back to those places (technically), there was an incredibly empty feeling. But sometimes you just got to move on with your life. And I still live nearby them, it isn’t like I’ll never see them again.

Semester 2

Now, to the stuff that’s a lot more relevant to the degree, being the actual degree… I’m doing ok. And by ‘ok’ I mean, I have resigned myself to ‘my GPA won’t mean shit for me as an arts student anyway’. I just want to pass. I just want to graduate.

I’m going to speak with a course advisor today about the structure of my last year and so hopefully that’ll work out for me. I’m also trying to figure out what I’m going to do when I do graduate. Do I want to study again and go through uni a third time? Do I want to just work and write on the side? I don’t know yet. It’ll depend on my financial situation I guess. I do know that there are other things I’d like to study but I don’t know if I’m good enough to do it at uni.

Other General Things

I’ve started running a DND campaign. My eating habits are still crap. My sleeping patterns are better since quitting the other job. I hate corporate editing. Grammar makes no sense. I want to do more craft. The scarf I was knitting is still at the same length as last time I posted this. I’m still pretty angry at the world for various reason. Queensland summer is coming in hot. Literally. And early.

Until next time \(^o^)/