I don’t want to turn into one of those people who has a blog for the sole purpose of complaining, but sometimes a girl just needs to get a few things off her chest. Will you, please, ever so kindly indulge me, for a just a few paragraphs? And then, when I’m done, if you’ll tell me I’m pretty and that you like my lip gloss?… I just KNEW I could count on you!

For starters, someone very close to me just discovered that she had a heart attack a few weeks ago. She went in for a physical, and the doctor freaked out over something on a Treadmill Testy Machine Thingy (am not a doctor, shut it). So she went in for more tests which were….inconclusive. At least this doctor didn’t see the images and say “OHMYGOD.” Now she has to go in to get one of those medi-camera images done where they put a laproscopic tube through her heart and look at the images. She might need a stint put in at the same time. They might discover that the damage is worse than they thought (but hopefully not). I know that I’m being very cryptic, but I promised this woman that I wouldn’t tell certain people (her friends/family) what was going on before she had a chance to, and on the off chance that one of them ends up reading this post, I want to do the best I can. I should, really, just not write about this, but I’m scared and I need to put it out there. I don’t want to imagine a life without her just yet. (Hi, Melodramatic? My name is Emily. Nice to finally meet you!)

I should make this next bit somewhat cryptic as well, but I can’t. So if I work with you, and you’re reading this, please pretend that you don’t know me and that this is just another random blog you found, OK? (If I start censoring myself too much, then I no longer see what good having a blog would do me.)

I’m not happy with my job situation right now. In fact, I’m distinctly UNhappy about it. About 6 months ago, my boss had a brainstorm (it didn’t hurt, I asked). She thought that we should move the production work that I’ve been doing so much of out of our small department and into it’s own area. It’d be the “academic production center,” or something. Any production projects for the school would come through the office: orientations, lectures, PSA’s, commercials, whatever. And, she thought, who better to head it up than me? I’ve been doing it, already, for years. I have the production background, even some time in LA Studios, as well as the academic sensibility we needed to sell the idea.

The concept went over swimmingly. There’s a great need for a central production office at the school. Everyone agreed that I’d be a great producer for it. And so I started doing even more production stuff, though unofficially, because everything still needed many approvals. Every time I started to get a little frustrated about the extra work and uncertainty, I remembered that it was just a matter of time, so I waited, patiently. Plus, I got a long overdue “extra” check for some of the projects I had done before this new position was created.

But now, 6 months of uncertainty later, everything is changing. My interview last week was mostly about how production was just a very small part of the job. That, really, it is another academic administrative role, with some production on the side. Which….is what I’ve been doing for the past 3 years. Only, this new job is higher profile, so there’s more responsibility, more stress, more highly visible mistakes. More pay, sure, but I’m getting the distinct feeling that my salary offer is not going to be quite what I’d expected, if it’s even in the ballpark. (Although, to be fair, I don’t know that and I could just be being pessimistic.) I have no doubt that it will be more money than what I make now, and in today’s economy, that’s nothing to scoff at, but still…

I feel trapped. I feel like I was told to expect X, but I got Y instead. And if it had been Y all along, I probably wouldn’t have bothered applying. Overall, I really like where I’ve been. I love my department, and even when some of the faculty drive me nutty, they’re still MY nutty faculty. I also feel like I don’t have much of a choice. The job, in essence, was created for me. I’m the only who’s qualified to do it…I made sure of that when I wrote the job description.

On the other hand, I really have been beyond fortunate with my job. Moving to California after working at Camp, I never thought I could get a real “grownup job” with an annual salary and benefits and everything; the fear of failure was one of the only was Camp had to keep its counselors. (Of course, I also thought that a job where I DIDN’T get groped in public by MY SUPERVISOR (more than once) was a novelty.) I’ve been able to go to graduate school for free; I’m 1.5 classes away from an MFA and I really never even dreamed that a graduate degree was a possibility. And, ever since I’ve been put in a “holding pattern” while waiting to get hired to my new position, I’ve been able to work from home most of the time, while still getting a regular pay check.

None of these are things I take lightly.

Perhaps I’m conditioned to think that I’m being taken advantage of, after years of working in an abusive job, but I just can’t shake the feeling, right now, that I’m being had. Maybe it’ll go away soon. Maybe tomorrow I’ll laugh at myself for being so goddamn paranoid. I mean, c’mon. My boss (who, by the way, is also my future boss, thanks to her new promotion) is wonderful, and I can’t think of anyone else I’d rather work for. She trusted me with creative projects that were way beyond my experience (and gave me tons of credit when they went well). She gave me, JS, AND my puppy (who peed on her floor….twice) a home when I was evacuated from my apartment for days on end. She’s fun to hang out with; when we go get drinks after work, we spend more time talking about our personal lives than about our jobs.

In all likelihood, I’ll take the offer, good or bad, because even if I refused it, I’d still be someone’s assistant, only without the established relationship or the opportunity for production work (and credits).  It just sorta sucks to feel so very stuck.

EDIT: to make things oh so much better, Tonks decided that today was a good day to tip over the recycle bin in the kitchen while I was at work. When I returned, she was veritably SWIMMING in chomped up, soggy scraps of paper that she was useless to help clean up. Bitch. (Cute bitch, sure, but still. Bitch.)

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