I pushed through the doors, resolved that everything would be different at work. So what, I didn’t get my dream job. Maybe my job wasn’t so bad after all. Sure it is killing my creative senses, but it supports my shopping habit moderately well, and allows me to travel on weekends and for two weeks to Europe in the Spring (details pending). There are a lot of homeless people in the world who would jump at the opportunity to be in my shoes. My new green shoes. I packed my healthy lunch, arrived at work with a smile on my face, poured a cup of coffee and turned on the computer.

The positivity lasted four minutes, as I finished entering my last password of the morning. Now what? What am I supposed to do here for eight straight hours?

Last week was not the best of weeks for me. I got a rejection letter for a job that I really really wanted. So much so that I was stressing about and being all vague, if you’ll recall. I will probably never be more qualified for a job, nor want a job more. Reeling from that, I returned to work, defeated and unhappy. How could I spend even five more months here, when I knew the perfect job was up the road, but it didn’t want me? I tried distracting myself on the Internet, started following an inordinate amount of people on Tumblr and searching for an apartment downtown on Craigslist, anything to alleviate the stress of a 55 minute drive to work every morning. I was just starting to feel better when I got called into an impromptu meeting with my team lead, where my usage of the Internet was called into question. Perhaps they said it was excessive, but I was tuned out, thinking about Googling the weather or searching last minute trips to Vegas. So maybe I didn’t get the point right away.

It turns out that trying to control your Internet usage while your brain melts from staggering non-use is about as hard as understanding this video with all the bleeps in it. Also Internet related, I might add. Okay, I admit it. I have a problem.

I thought about giving up this blog all together. I gave it serious thought. Deleting it all and starting my life post-blog. Don’t get me wrong, I love this space. It helps me stretch my brain muscles less they get atrophied during my working hours. But I don’t exactly want to get fired for it. Not unless my dream job decides they’ve made a fatal mistake and comes crawling back to me. But giving up my only source of creative release at this moment doesn’t solve the problem. Not now. Blogging, like love, is a battlefield.

So I’m staying here, for now. I might be a little quieter on commenting, and I do hope you’ll forgive me. Just imagine me chained to my desk, earbuds stuffed in, pecking away at a Microsoft Word document blog-entry disguised to look like work, job and apartment searching at lunch, slyly posting when everyone is in meetings and peeking behind the monitor to say Happy Monday.

How was your weekend?

Did the Oscars please you? Because besides beautiful showings by my girlfriends Keri Russell and Jennifer Garner, Glen Hansard begging me to “make art” and Jon Stewart letting Markéta Irglová give her eloquent acceptance speech after they rudely shut off her microphone and that adorable French gal winning for Best Actress and claiming angels in Los Angeles and Helen Mirren’s diamond sleeves and the charming George Clooney seated in the front row, they were just annoying enough to keep me awake.

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