This is the End?

I don't know what to say right now. I guess I was just figuring that by now, someone, SOMEWHERE, would have read my blog. But I don't think it's happening. Now, I don't really know for sure that the only readers of my online bitching journal are my lovely wife and my loving mother, but I am pretty sure that they are indeed, it.

A little disappointing, to say the least. Not that my mother and wife are bad people or anything like that and I am ashamed of them reading my blog, its just that, well, two people...

You get the idea. It kind of sucks.

But as my good Little League coach said EVERY time I screwed up: "Just have fun."

Obviously he hadn't been actually watching me play, or he would have brought me over to the bench, sent the other kids out to their positions, and had a 'heart-to-heart' with me about 'naturally gifted baseball players' and 'not-so-naturally gifted baseball players.'

Anyhow, I haven't written in a while to to be honest, I have been feeling bad about it. I have some kind of guilt complex or something because, out of the blue, I have been offered a writing job at a local agency. Now, after a year of being very unemployed and taking on jobs that I shudder to think about, I am actually going to be receiving paychecks for something I want to do. I have heard this referred to as a "career," but I think it is still much too early to think of anything that serious sounding;

I have to be honest here. I am terrified of starting this new job. I don't know what it is. Maybe its like I am just used to sitting at home, looking for jobs, and playing 'Halo.' I mean, yeah, it was a meager existance. And yeah, I was very depressed. And yeah, suicide was starting to look like a viable option to getting out of debt...

I guess the point I am trying to make is that it is going to weird, is all. On Monday morning, I will walk into the office, meet people, immediately forget their names, smile a lot, meet more people, and immediately forget their names as well. Oh, and probably you know, work and have lunch.

But I haven't done that new-hire stuff for five years, so its going to be strange.

So with all of that said, where do I go from here? Obviously this blog isn't creating that much buzz - I have yet to make it on Blogger's 'Blogs Of Note,' a goal of mine since I first started this thing. Do I start a new blog? Maybe one that chronicles my new adventures in an ad agency? Or keep writing here about various stuff? I could do both, but then I would have to quit my new job which would mean I would be back to writing this boring crap.

And why am I asking questions here? There will be no responses, no suggestions. Who am I kidding? No one reads this shit.

Is this the end?

Stupid questions...

Interesting. Very VERY Interesting...

I mentioned before I have an overactive imagination. So much so that I wasted good job searching time and energy into proving that my imagination is both a plus and a negative in my life. If you want more info, check out the mis-titled "Miracle" and "Imagine" posts.

Anyhow.

It has been a while since my last post, and no doubt both of my readers have been wondering where the hell I've been. Well, that's actually a false statement in that one of my readers is my wife and the other is my mom, so in fact, they know EXACTLY where the hell I've been. Which is at home, looking for jobs in between bouts of depression, self-loathing, and playing 'Halo' - an unbelievably cool XBOX game. More on Halo a little later.

Back to self-loathing.

I'm funny in that when I am depressed, I don't really emote the same 'depressed' characteristics as most; I don't carve my arms up with steak knives and make fun of anti-depressants on a daily basis - any depressed person would never, EVER make fun of Prozac.

Ever.

Therefore, I don't see myself as depressed. But a few weeks ago, I started feeling differently towards what exactly depression is. I was feeling down, there was no denying that one. I lost out on a job, got a temp freelance gig, and then felt hopeless again blah blah blah. You know the story.

But then The Soprano's came on. Because the plot lines are very intricate, I can't recount exactly which episode it was, but 1 line spoken from Dr. Melfi to Tony stuck with me:

"Depression is anger turned inward."

Tony is an angry guy. I mean, let's face it: the guy has family issues that I cannot begin to comprehend. But there is one thing that I can relate to with the character, and that's the intense anger and short temper he is always having to deal with. Not to mention he has a little bit of a weight problem - basically all components of my personality.

Given, I am not getting separated or divorced or dealing with rival gang bosses trying to whack me or my guys. But I do know what its like to feel angry and not let it out. You blow something off on the outside, but on the inside the pressure just builds and builds and the smallest things can set you off into doing something you usually regret.

Now, if you are wondering where I am getting, there (sadly) aren't any all-night binges involving cocaine and strippers or anything like that. Actually, for one of the first times in my life, I just accepted the fact that I was powerless in the whole situation - I can't hire me, I can only try to get someone to hire me - and tried to move on.

Which brings me to tonight. I just got back from the gym after enduring a pretty rough workout - I was pushing myself very hard because I was furious about a phone call I had received earlier and embarrassed about the one I had about five minutes later. The first was an asshole credit guy informing me that I am in debt and that I really should think about paying it. You gotta love it, right? Some of them take a super-aggressive approach and bring out the heavy artillery: "Your credit report - BOOM!," or "Repossesion - BANG!" You know, try to scare you into paying them. Little do they realize that I have no money to pay them anyways, so the joke's on them. HA!

But it's the 'nice guy' approach that kills me. I want to believe in them, that they truly want to help me out and make paying these ungodly interest rates a little easier to handle. These are the people that don't say the words "collections" or "litigation" - they say things like "smaller payment plans" and "leniency." But in the end, I had to tell him what all self-respecting men in my position credit card assholes: "My wife will call you tomorrow. She handles the bills."

Not a good start to my afternoon by any perspective. However, the second phone call came, and things started to look up. I called the agency rep that had given me my first radio gig and asked - begged - for more work. He said he was working a project out for me to work on for the same client, but that "July looks good." This confused me to no end. In the words of Michael Bolton: "PC load letter?! What the fuck does that mean?!" But, going against my normally cowardly self, I asked what he meant. He replied that July was when he can hire me full time. Now, take a moment for this to set in, because I sure as hell didn't. In fact, I even went so far to ask this string of brilliant inquiries:

Him: "July we can afford to bring you on full time."

Me: "...You promise?" (Yes. I asked this.)

Him (understandably stunned by such a stupid question): "Uhh...yeah. We have a couple new clients and we are down one writer..."

Me: "You swear to God?" (Trust me. I keep cringing everytime I replay this little scene in my head...not one of my brighter moments.)

Him:

Well, tomorrow I get to dig out a stump for my other reader. Yay!