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UGH. That's my main feeling these days. I wish I could do what you say, Andy, but I have not been able to exercise at all since I started the new job (ok, it's only been two weeks!). The first week I just couldn't really do anything other than go to work, come home, and sleep. The second week I got very, very sick with a horrible sinus infection that had me running a fever for four days straight. Did my boss/colleagues care? Nope, had to go to work all the same and spread my germs around. It was a TOUGH week. So basically again, 10 hour work day, 8 hours of sleep (I am not willing to cut into my sleep time to exercise, or do anything else - I become very depressed again very quickly if I **** with my sleep requirements) almost an hour commute each way... well, you can do the math. I would have time to squeeze in a run here and there, but not if I'm also trying to cook from scratch (which is something I try to do as much as possible, both for health and finance reasons!). And there's very little chance I could make my gym classes that I love so much, because of the time conflict. So I'm pretty depresssed about that front right now, but I hope to get something sorted out once I settle into the job more.
However, I'm basically just depressed. Period. My job is terrible, and it is obvious that I am going to burn out on it. I have not left before 7 really ever, and I get there at 8:30am. I've been told, at 6pm, to clean up other people's mistakes, and then when I didn't know how to because of lack of training and made a mistake, got yelled at for it. There are some interesting skills that I am picking up on the job (a LOT of software and applications and programming that I am getting much more comfortable with) and I do get to do some interesting work with languages at times, but generally the corporate vibe and office feel are terrible. I dont' see a window basically the entire time, and I'm very sensitive to sunlight deprivation (I'm totally one of those people who needs a sunlamp, my doctor said,but they are PRICEY. We'll see). Basically, I keep waffling between thinking I am being a spoiled brat ("this is the real world," "welcome to the working world," "what did you think, you were better than this?" etc etc) and that I just need to accept that leaving academia (which I wanted to do) was maybe a mistake, and that I need to suck it up and learn to adapt to low wage exploitation somehow. And then the other side of me is really, really angry, as I have spent years doing hard work and studying and teaching and translating and whatnot and I have applied to 268 jobs and this was my ONLY offer? And this idea that a better world is possible, not only that people can have jobs that they like that don't kill them slowly with exhaustion, but that a work/life balance can be rearranged in a different way. that the world does not NECESSARILY have to be a series of capitalistic exploitations. Needless to say, despite having a crap job I still don't have health insurance or any kind of those things which should be HUMAN RIGHTS not "perks". I am just getting increasingly disillusioned about the working world and our current socioeconomic landscape. My dad just retired yesterday. He told me that he felt so relieved to have his professional career behind him, rather than in front of him as I do. He said he would not wish our current working climate on anyone. There was a time (and there are still places, outside of the US, of course) where you could have a job or a career AND A LIFE. AND BE A PERSON. I feel like I have been sold into wage slavery.
Ok, this is a bit hyperbolic sounding, perhaps. But this is really how I feel. I feel as though the good part of my life is over, and it's drudgery and horror from here on out. I need to remember that this is not the end of my professional life, but the beginning.
Did I mention the part where I lost a contract for a 900 page book translation? (and thus like, 3 years' work). Yep so the shittiest thing happened. I had an editor at Yale University PRess that I was working on this project with. My samples had been approved by her, and had gone into peer review. I was expecting a decision (probably good!) any day. I hadn't heard in a month or so. I got an email from my editor's assistant, saying that the editor had quit her job, and gone to Princeton UP, and had abandoned all her current open projects. A new editor had come on board and had selected a different translator, completely disregarding the peer review which had approved me. The editor hadn't even had the decency to CONTACT ME to tell me she was LEAVING HER JOB. I feel so hopeless and dejected and well, like I have no control over my life. With all these professional losses it's hard to be positive. I basically didn't drink for several days because I was TOO depressed and tired. BUt last night I overdid it with my "freedom" and am paying for it today.
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TSM, second year.
Attempting to keep my drinks below 3 for each session, and below 10 for the week.
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My only problem is that now my job is keeping me later than my usual classes at the gym are....so the next couple weeks might be yoga-less until I can figure out something new. But I do love it, and it helps massively with stress.