The past two weeks.....

What do you do when you love your job but hate the city you live in? Sure, I work for a large company that has several locations across the country so transferring isn't really a problem. But what happens when you become attached to the people you work with? Not romantically and it's still a little too early to call them friends, but nonetheless a kind of bond has been formed. If I leave, I'll leave behind this enchanting show and the cast of people who work it. I loved the show from the first time I saw it, but now that I've worked with the people and gotten to know them a little bit, even if the other locations have the same show, it won't be the same. The chemistry among the performers will be different, they will be different people with different names and different personalities. I've already established a working relationship with them and I can tell that a few of the performers really like me and know that will do my best to cater to their needs.
So what do I do? Do I leave this city and transfer someplace a little closer to home after my contract and lease end six months from now? Or do I stick to my original plan of living here for a couple of years and seeing where I go from there? It seems silly to stay in an environment that I hate just for a group of people and a show, but that's how much I love them. I don't know if they see how much I care but I tell them that I really do love the show. Just going there makes me forget about how lonely I am sometimes. If I'm having a bad day, all I need to do is walk by the birds that are used in the show and instantly I feel better. It's really hard to feel sad when as I am walking by a bird goes "ooOOOooo". Yes, I feel flattered when a bird compliments me.
Besides the show, I do enjoy most of the tasks and requirements of my job. Again, it's not the most glamorous job in the world, but it's the first step of my career. Do I feel like my bosses hate me? Yes, I do. But I keep on doing what I need to do because what else can I do?
I don't know what happened, but the past couple of weeks have been downright miserable. Maybe I was just picking up on everybody's stress and internalizing it. Or maybe I said something that offended someone and no one had the decency to tell me about it and gave me the high school silent/alienation treatment. Or maybe it was all in my head and I only imagined that no one was talking to me. I remained almost dead silent for two weeks. The only things I said were "What do you want me to do next?" and other such comments pertaining to work. But I didn't converse socially. Even at lunch I remained pretty quiet too. Was I in the doghouse for something? I just felt so isolated. I'd go home and fall asleep. I wasn't eating because I didn't have an appetite. I kept telling myself "Just get through this day". Then my supervisor tells me that my boss was saying that a number of people were not working fast enough and not being productive enough and that I wasn't the only one, but my name came up a lot. What the hell? I was constantly asking for things to do and I was the one that was sent to run around, and I was the one that was sent to find things; what more could I possibly do? I was on my way to lunch when she told me that. When I got to the cafeteria, I got a little bit of some kind of macaroni salad and went to a place where I was almost certain to be alone and I cried. What more could I do? I was doing everything in my power to stay out of trouble, be a good employee, and earn at the very least a decent recommendation. All that was quickly blowing up in my face. Of course they weren't specific as to what I was or wasn't doing so I accepted it and continued working. When I went back to work, I held my composure enough to ask for my next task. What could I do?

You would hope at some point in time  all the high school drama and bullshit would end. That people would grow up and simply talk to each other when there was a disagreement and rationally come to a conclusion. I'm beginning to understand that will probably never happen. I don't know what happened, but from one day to the next everything returned to normal. Maybe it was high stress levels. I did wear my evil eye bracelet to work a couple of times and MadDogBV did order an evil eye pendant for me. I swear, the day I wore that bracelet, everything returned to normal. Maybe somebody really was giving me the evil eye.
But now that I get to work with my beloved show for the next week, and I got to see it 3 times in 3 days last week, I know nothing can hurt me.