#305
On to the next
In mid-2024, I’d been working at a tech company for about five and a half years when I got the opportunity to take a contract-based, government-adjacent job. The pay was good, the institution prestigious, and I had grown impatient with inertia at the tech company. I took the job and was very happy when my contract was renewed after six months.
You’ll all be at least passingly familiar with various executive orders on Federal hiring freezes and RIFs, and while these did not apply directly to the institution where I worked, they came home to roost, and my contract was not renewed. In the seven months since, if my rough calculations are correct, I’ve applied for about 500 jobs. I applied for roles I was well-suited for, and for roles that seemed like a stretch. I applied for full-time work, contract gigs, freelance assignments, anything I could find.
I have no idea how many of these applications were viewed by human eyes, and I received many strange rejection emails in the most convoluted and confusing language. I would often receive these in batches, at odd hours, like in the middle of the night or on Sunday afternoon, as if the applicant tracking systems were working together to clear a backlog.
I got interviews with ten companies (that’s a 2% response rate FWIW), three of which did not move me forward. I made it to six final rounds and, in one case, actually did get the job, only to have the role paused when the hiring manager left before the offer was extended. One company decided they needed to hire someone based in Europe; in two other cases, I simply wasn’t the final choice. And last week, I withdrew from one process after I signed an offer for another.
It’s a good role, and I like the people I met during the process. I’m obviously very glad to have found a job at all, but fortunately, I am also looking forward to the work. And for all the horror stories about bad interview processes, most of mine were pretty normal. I would say 90% of the people I dealt with were sincerely trying to provide a good experience and find the right candidate. The other 10% were either inexperienced or simply unrealistic.
There are a lot – A LOT – of problems with modern hiring practices, and specifically in hiring processes for marketing roles. AI has not helped at all. And I do feel for the recruiters and HR people who are also just trying to do their jobs, because everything is so broken that they are overwhelmed with applications from bots and LLMs and just regular people who aren’t qualified, but apply anyway because they really need to find something, and (I can tell you from direct and recent experience) often think “why not?” because everything is already completely broken, so who cares.
Anyway, I am glad to be done, though I remain so snakebit by that early fake-out that I won’t truly relax until I get started. But the agreement has been signed and countersigned, I’m all set up in various systems, and it seems like everything is progressing as it should.
I have a week to get a few things accomplished before I start my job, primarily giving my home office a once-over. It hasn’t been used much at all in half a year, and it would probably be better to start with a literal clean slate than just sitting down amongst my interview detritus and depression junk.
There is also a half-finished or maybe not even quarter-finished project up there, which is restoring a handbag that I probably should just give up on. It’s sitting on the coffee table in my office alongside all the leather tools and unguents I bought to make a go of it.
This is BY FAR not the only thing I’ve failed to accomplish during my long, unintentional sabbatical. I also meant to finish at least one quilt; I haven’t touched it. The fireproof and floodproof safe I bought last year for our important documents is still in its box in the bedroom closet. And the old ladder that was in our garage when we moved in – the one I want to cut down and make into a quilt display rack – is still sitting alongside the garage, out in the elements, waiting to be dealt with. There’s a midcentury bench in the basement that needs gluing, sanding, and refinishing. These are just the ones I can think of off the top of my head.
I know life is always kind of like this, but I do feel a little regretful about the wasted time. I suppose I found it difficult to think about much of anything beyond getting work, and it was often hard to enjoy Living In The Moment when a big part of my life felt like it was up in the air. (I did, however, make a lot of good bread and a lot of good food; I also highly recommend a good unemployment vacation when possible.)
As I waited for a decision about my new job, I tried to tell myself that, whatever happened, things would be okay. I felt calmer this time about the possibility of getting rejected. I’d done my best; there was literally nothing else I could do. They’d hire me or not. And of course, that was true all along, but this time when I tried to access the panic – the but what if they don’t LIKE me and what if they don’t HIRE me of it all – it simply wasn’t there.
I was as close to feeling nothing about it as possible, and then it just…happened. I don’t really believe in woo stuff like manifesting or whatever, but if that’s what worked, great. Now I will focus on not caring about recieving a massive inheritance from a mysterious benefactor.
I don’t know how many of you already know this about me, but there was a time not so long ago when I bought a LOT of nail polish, like a lot a lot, because I loved it and because I did my nails three or four times a week. I got to a point where I could give myself an excellent manicure in about 30 minutes, and I found it very relaxing and very fun. Eventually, I set myself up to do gel manicures at home, too.
This is the kind of hobby that is likely to attract a lot of negative comments, some from people who would just never paint their nails neon green (or whatever), and some from people who seemed to be jealous of those 30 minutes every other day or so. The one I got fairly often was “you must have a lot of spare time,” which was never worth responding to but was extremely nasty all the same, laden as it was with general derision and the implication I was supposed to be doing something more productive, less pleasurable, or as unpleasant as whatever the person who said it was doing.
I wish there were a device, like a speaker you could wear, that would translate in real-time what people really mean when they say shit like this, so that “you must have a lot of spare time” would come out as “I am sad my cuticles are nasty” or “I am mad that I don’t let myself enjoy things.” I am of course projecting here, but you get what I’m saying. Not everyone has to polish their nails? You don’t have to pay any attention to me at all!
Anyway, I don’t do my nails much anymore. I developed a reaction to something in the polish or the remover, I don’t know, but my nails really started to fall apart (literally), and I’ve gone mostly without for months now. In my French lesson this week, my teacher brought up nail polish for some reason, and I blurted out my terrible secret: I am a longtime nail polish hoarder. I went so far as to show her a drawer full of my treasures, and it was a nice stroll down memory lane, though I am a) acutely aware that I have somehow further damaged America's reputation and b) unsure what to do with all this nail polish.
On Sunday, the weather was very pleasant, and I spent a lot of time puttering in the kitchen. I baked some cowboy cookies (I scooped and froze the dough last week so I can bake small batches whenever cookies are needed) and made a batch of buckwheat granola for the first time in a long while. For dinner, I made a pizza with hot Italian sausage, fresh mozzarella, and the oyster mushrooms and garlic scapes from our first CSA bag of the season.
Today it is going to be hot as blazes, so I’m not sure what dinner will be, but it won’t be anything having to do with the oven. I may stovetop-steam some frozen dumplings and perhaps make this with our CSA kale. As my friend Camilla reminded me last week, kohlrabi week will be here soon enough, so I should enjoy the halcyon kale days while I can.
Congratulations on the new job!