Girl on the Brink: Surviving Desperate Times with Desperate Measures

My most promising job leads vanished last week, and I’m crushed by the thought of starting over with my job search. A call from a recruiter and email from an HR director told me I’m being passed over for more promising candidates.

Eight months have lapsed since I lost my full-time job, and it’s getting harder to stop at eating one chocolate-chip cookie or waiting until the clock strikes 5 to pour a glass of wine.

Sometimes, I feel as if no one knows I’m alive, or cares, except for the bill collectors and my children, who depend on me to deliver their apple cider and French Toaster Sticks to them for breakfast. I don’t need a pity party to hear others say, “I’m sorry you lost your job” and then walk away because they don’t know what else to say.

People work because they have to. I understand that. I’m not a trust-funded kid. But I do want to enjoy my work, and I love writing and turning a phrase just so. I just wished it paid better, and that there weren’t so many wannabes who are willing to deflate the cost of writing to gain experience and clips. I’ve got clips.

I don’t have a lot of people to commiserate with, either. Despite massive layoffs that continue to spike upward, I don’t know anyone else who’s lost a job, except my ex-husband, whom I’m forced to live with.

Perhaps if I would leave the house I’d bump into one of them. My options for lunch are now Bread for the City on 7th Street Northwest, not the Bread & Chocolate bakery near Chevy Chase Circle.

I have to believe that my current situation isn’t forever, that my life will not necessarily get easier but will get better. It has to. America, for the most part, is a land of survivors, and I believe I’m one of them.