Schreiber

(Written while sitting around church because I'd forgotten that I'd never gotten the keys to the bell tower back, so I'm extra pissed off.)

So l just accepted a job with a tutoring company, and now my stomach feels like it has a bunch of snakes in it, and I'm kind of wishing I'd written back instead no, on second thought I don't think I want to go forward with this. 🐍

I'd applied because they supposedly pay fairly well, and I figured I had a good chance of actually being hired. (Self-evidently accurate.) But as the reality of the situation sunk in, I realized: this is going to be yet another job that I'm not excited about--which in itself isn't a problem, I've given up actually trying to figure out my vocation, ideal job or purpose in life, figuring that if my purpose in life is suddenly revealed to me in a flash of light, then great; otherwise I'll find meaning and identity in my hobbies and in trying to be a decent human being. But that' probably won't work as well--and it's a shitty way to live--if I have sharply limited free time and am stressed out all the time. And this is going to be another job that I'm not excited about, at irregular hours, where when you have to start and stop working is very nebulous. And that's going to stress me out and sharply reduce my useful free time (since tutoring presumably happens mostly in the evenings, when I want to be doing other stuff.)

Also, it's a job working with people. I hate those. And they tend to burn me out rapidly.


And then there's the mere fact that I have a bad feeling about this. There have been too many times in the past when I had a bad feeling about something, couldn't find a logical reason why, ignored it, and wound up wishing I hadn't. I hate to go all woo-woo or act like I'm claiming to have the least useful form of divine inspiration ever, but I'm starting to think my subconscious mind sometimes figures stuff out before the rest of me does.

So whaddo I do, internet? Take a chance on this job, try to give it a fair chance, and at worst...actually not worst, there are so many ways it can go worse than that...at second-best, then, kick the can of finding a job I don't hate a little further down the road? Or go with my gut and get the hell away from this?

...Maybe I should try to become a bank clerk.

ETA: My brother pointed out that, since it looks like I'm going to have at least SOME control over what tutoring assignments I take on, I can see what's on offer, and then if ALL of them suck (or look like they're gonna suck) for one reason or another, I can just say No to all of them, and say "I'm sorry, I don't think anything you have is actually the sort of thing I want to do."* So I think I'm going to go with that option.

OTOH, I am being reminded that the other thing I hate about part-time jobs is that, given too many responsibilities (and n>3), I tend to either neglect some of them until n≤3, or have my brain seize up and just surf the internet and do none of them.

* He had some super-brilliant phrase for how to do this (because of course he did), but which I've now forgotten.

OK, srsly world. Why is there not a "What is this I don't even" rubber stamp? Or perhaps one with "What the hell ass balls".

Such stamps should be issued, automatically and for free, to anyone who has to teach a writing-intensive course these days.

----
Addendum:
O, fml. I'm trying to cover Industrialization and 19th-c. ideological movements tomorrow, am't I. WHY did I think this was a good idea?

I feel as though I ought to feel something about the Boston Marathon bombings; but after Oklahoma City, 9/11, Sandy Hook, and the rest, I've just gotten used to national tragedies; and I'm too caught up in personal tragedies. All I've got is profound relief that none of you got hit by scrapnel (err...right?); and the feeling that the following is a bit insignificant by comparison. But:

Things that are making me sad this evening:
- The amount I just agreed to spend on bike repair.
- The fact that it makes sense for this to be a higher priority than fixing (or indeed keeping) the Mob.
- The smell of malt on the wind, when I haven't felt like I could afford beer since Christmas.
- The quality of my students' papers. And following on from that,
a) the fact that the writing guide is now going to have to feature yet another warning: When writing on controversial topics, please be aware that the bar is higher for papers of this type. In addition, please check snopes.com before finalizing your paper topic.
b) the several students who haven't submitted papers, and are going to fail in consequence.
- The fact that one of you referenced a song that I used to have on this computer, and which of course went down the tubes the last time I had to reboot the system.

This evening:
I'm drinking instant coffee. And trying to decide whether it's better or worse than the real stuff I brew.
I'm drinking coffee at all because I'm not sure how much sleep I'm gonna get. Midterm grades* are due tomorrow, and submitting those, in turn, means actually grading all the in-class essays I failed to get done this weekend. In addition, I promised myself that I would have their first *serious* writing assignment ready to go...and since I wanted to do my usual Document Analysis thang, but am now teaching world history instead of Western Civ., I have spent much of the past 36 hours bashing my head against Confucius to try to create for them a selection from the Analects encapsulating Master Kongzi's political philosophy.
All of this in addition to actually prepping for tomorrow's lecture.

...Aaand so I'm blogging. Of course.

My mind, meanwhile, has already skipped ahead to NEXT weekend, when I'll be hiking Owl's Head, aka the most hated mountain in New Hampshire, with my brother. (Although this expedition is going to be much less hardcore than I'd anticipated: with overnight temperatures of 29F forecast, Dan vetoed staying at a campsite, and is booking us a motel; and on the other hand, daytime temperatures are supposed to be non-ridiculous, and there will be NO mosquitoes.)

* We're less than halfway through the semester: it's just that Administration wants the students to have some warning about how well--or otherwise--they're doing.

OK. Now I'm hired.

Which is a good thing (and thank you all for your good wishes!) But life is not universally sunny...

1) Being hired means I have to create a syllabus. From scratch, since I took a look at my predecessor's syllabi and...welll...it's like the left-wing equivalent of my predecessor at SNHU's. (As in, "This is kinda too much to expect of Freshmen, AND ...wait, is she trying to brainwash them?? On both counts, I don't think they have the critical thinking skills necessary...)

So. Um. Syllabus.

In three weeks.

Let alone the fact that teaching World History is a matter of trying to cram about three intro courses worth of history and historiography and basic critical thinking and text analysis into one unit. (Or as 'the Rhinoceros' put it, "The trick - and it's really hard - is to keep the students grounded as you hurl huge amounts of data at them.")
Hopefully I can get a discount on their textbook: it seems to be by far the least stupid option.

But still. Syllabus in three weeks. I suspect that by the end it's going to be a struggle not to bum cigarettes off my FUTURE students.

1a) Writing a syllabus effectively means I have an extra part-time job. For which I am not getting paid.
And while MECA's paying me more than I ever got paid as an adjunct, that's still only "ALMOST enough not to be insulting," and thus a long way still from "Enough that I can take three weeks off from temping and/or token job applications."
Which would be nice, given that I have to read three books, fret a lot, create a new quiz ex nihilo, design a course from the bottom up, get the textbook straightened out, find the additional readings, and deal with six kinds of bureaucratic crap.

[And naturally, this is the week I really have a yearning to go visit New Haven and/or climb a mountain. Boo.]

2) Did I mention that SNHU has taken me off their shortlist of online profs?
< breathe >
Well. We know where COCE can go, and what they can do there.

3) Peter will be joining me for the week after next. While I suppose this is a good thing, this means I will get no temping done, and that any course prep. will be done sitting outside my door in the interval between putting him to bed and crashing myself.

Oh, and
4) Summer(+ global warming) -> Hot -> High humidity -> Condensation in belowground areas -> all my stuff is growing mold.

...
On the plus side...well, various relatives will be helping me wrangle Peter, and I got interviewed for a p/t NON-canvassing job with Environment Maine. (If I get it, between it and MECA and some temping/random commissions, I'll actually be making enough to be solidly in the black, AND keep my sanity.) Fingers crossed...