The One With...

I am a Feminist...
See, it wasn't all that hard.

A few weeks back I read a blog from a student declaring that although she wasn't embarrassed to be a feminist, oh heavens no, she didn't want to be identified as one unless it was on her terms. I think that is all kinds of ridiculous. Personally I want to be a feminist no matter how anyone views me from that one little word.

The writer continues to say that she only dislikes the label because she doesn't want to be known as one of those "frumpy lesbians" or a "sexist with only womens interests at heart" This causes two problems; one, feminism is about equal rights, I don't want my rights to come at the expense of your rights. I just want to be seen as a person rather than a walking uterus. two, instead of backing down and accepting these stereotypes you do have the choice to argue against and defend your values. Surely it's better to inform and educate rather than denying who you are.

As women we have so much to be thankful for and we owe a huge debt to women who died to earn us rights that they will have never seen nor believed possible. I can now do things unchaperoned (unless I'm a woman at BUCU) I can vote, I have better maternity rights at work and basically I can just do what I like, which is awesome. Refusing to label yourself as a feminist for such ridiculous reasons throws that effort back in their faces.

We still have a very long way to go to establish equality for everyone but I find it insulting for any woman to deny being a feminist. To paraphrase Caitlin Moran, "Do you identify as a woman? Yes? Then you're a feminist."

Getting rejected for a job sucks. It's as simple as that.

Everyone has had one. That one job that makes you question whether the whole world is actually horrible, evil and everything before that had been a lie.

I should've written this before, when I referenced it, but hindsight is a wonderful thing.

My Job From Hell was recent, very recent. I was sent by the job centre to a small company in the heart of my hometown. It was temporary maternity cover, a breeze. The firm was family owned and pretty much family staffed, I was the only one not related to someone in some way, I think that was the first clue this wasn't going to be good. It wasn't a bad job work wise, I got my head down and got on with it, bit of basic accounts, filing, stuff I could do.

What I didn't bank on when starting was my colleague. She was a nasty piece of work, bitter and spiteful, ready to retire but not financially able. I initially tried to get on with her because that's the kind of person I am, I'd talk to a tree if there was no one about. However she didn't like me. On sight she wanted to get rid of me, I was too young apparently, naive and optimistic. She began a war to chip away at my self esteem and everything about me.
It started with little digs about my education and my degree "you'll never get anywhere with a journalism degree, university is worthless." I just sighed and carried on with my work thinking that she was just a rude woman with no "appropriate conversation" filter. After that it was just constant digs about how much better her children had gotten on than I had without university, so on and so forth. Along with those digs was the fun little "tips" about my weight, shaming me with "should you *really* be eating that?" pretty much every time I put a fork in my mouth.

Sadly whilst I was there my Nan died, she'd been suffering with Alzheimer's for a long while along with other illnesses so i was a long time coming but heartbreaking none the less. The colleague knew this as her mother and my grandmother had once lived in the same care home. Now this was the unveiling of her true colours, she was both malicious and crafty. She started saying awful things about poorly people but only when we were alone. She claimed that Alzheimer's was a disease "sluts" got and that it wasn't worth mourning someone with Alzheimer's as "they'd died long ago, the real part of them." Just typing it now sends a hot pain through my heart.

She was very money oriented, a trait that I just don't get. I was advised to "bag a rich man, quickly" and that she was very disappointed her daughter was with a broke and failed musician. The true extent was made known after I came back from the funeral, I was basically a tearful mess for a while, Nan and I were pretty close, she thought it was appropriate to say she wished her mother and mother in law would hurry up and die before they spent up all her inheritance. I have never wished harder for two people to find the joys of booze, gambling and male strippers quite as much as I did that day.

The cruelty continued but I figured "hey, I need a job so suck it up" but the final straw was yet to come. It's funny now I look back on it the last straw was trivial. She had been teaching me processes incorrectly from the start and had banned me from using "her" programme as it was "too difficult for me to understand" but she was leaving all the hard work to me and reveling in the fact I occasionally struggled. She'd sit at her desk chatting, shopping on eBay and once in a while doing a bit of stapling and all the while she'd be telling staff and customers(!) that I was crap at my job, useless and a "muppet" and implying I shouldn't be paid as I was doing nothing.

I started to see red and complained to the management, I gave them a detailed description of her antics and all I got in return was "well we could speak to her and give her a warning but then she'd get worse and you don't want that" On that bombshell I took an evening to reflect and the next day we came to the conclusion that it wasn't working out, loses should be cut and I should just walk away. I haven't felt relief like it. I told the manager in my exit interview that she wouldn't stop her behaviour and she'd bully my replacement right out of the door. He just replied, with a resigned sigh, "yes, we know"

That, my friends, was my job from hell. On paper it seems shorter and less awful but in person it felt like time had stopped and I truly dreaded ever going to work. I went back to the job centre to warn them what would happen to the next poor soul to walk through those doors and the advisor assured me that they'd never send anyone back. So far they've been true to their word. I found a mutual friend who knew the lady who's maternity I was covering, the lady is scared to go back due to the colleague. How sad is that?

Now, this isn't a call to a pity party. It wasn't the ideal employment but in one way I'm glad it happened. I don't take crap anymore, I feel stronger and more confident in myself and I'm even more determined to succeed. She may have thought she'd won forcing me out but she's the one stuck in a job she hates full of nothing but bitter words and a hateful soul. If that's winning then I'm happy to have lost.


p.s If you take anything from this blog, don't be bullied at work. An average person spends a third of their life at work and that is a heck of a lot of time to be sad, angry, upset and generally not thinking life is awesome. Seriously.

"I like having my hair and face done, but I'm not going to lose weight because someone tells me to."                                                                                                                         - Adele

So I got a job.

I thought I'd be thrilled. I was initially but I've been there for almost 4 weeks and I've just had a technical promotion. When people quit you tend to be bumped up the ranks quickly without a massive amount of training. Sadly with higher responsibility comes more rubbish.

I'm trying to be very careful about what I write. I like my job. I really do. I'm good at it, I adore my colleagues and I don't stop from 9 - 5. These things I like. Now on to the things I don't.

I work for an organisation that provides a service to people for free that the rest of the population pay for. What saddens me most about this role is that so many people are so very ungrateful.  I can only assume that the more things you are give for free the more they expect. My role is the front line of customer service... by this I mean the complaints service. Touch wood I've been relatively lucky with people I've spoken to, they've all been so lovely. I even had someone tell me to have a lovely day. However colleagues have been told they're shameful, disgusting, awful human beings... for providing a free service. Now, we retaliate occasionally, leaving appointments till last minute and leaving people on hold a touch longer than necessarily. Small penalties for not having the courtesy to just be nice, to not lie, to not swear.

The point I'm trying to make is, "be lovely to everyone" especially if they're doing you a service. You catch more flies with honey than you do with vinegar. And your appointment will be earlier if you aren't a dick.

Simple.

How a society treats its disabled is the true measure of a civilization.

My dad is disabled. I've only become more open about this in the last few years.
For a long while I just didn't see anything was different. Then one of the first people I talked to about it made horrible comments so it became something I didn't mention.

Dads disability was a hidden one for many years. I suppose in a way it still is. He has never had a real, solid diagnosis and we're coming up to twelve years. Can you imagine that? Being in pain day in, day out for 12 years. I live with him and some days I can't even believe he can stand it. We've had doctors tell him that it's this, it's that and most insultingly "it's all in his head" and my mother panders to him and makes it worse. Now they play with his medication, sign it off and he's on his way. The doctors he's seen have reached the consensus that they can't figure it out so from now on the best they will do is try to help with the pain.

Pain pills is the biggest argument inducing headache of the household. It's not unusual to be summoned just to be asked "have I taken my pills today?" "err yes." "shit." He's on so much medication that there are times when I think that if you shook him he'd rattle but it's the pill changes that are the worst.
The mixture kills his appetite stone dead which after all this time we're quite used to. However guests are not. Going out to eat is just a nightmare. He'll either order and barely touch it, eat like he's been starved or not order at all. The first time we went out with a friend he decided not to order and go for a wander instead, this obviously confused our guest so she asked if he was eating. My response of "No, he can have a bourbon biscuit or two later" didn't help matters. His diet does consist of bourbons, sausage rolls, oat and raisin cookies and beans. I've met toddlers that eat more.

Going out is a stress anyway. The last bonding experience we had was seeing batman at the cinema. We have to do reccie's for comfort before handing over money otherwise we'd be leaving half way through. Many mainstream cinemas have stairs and uncomfortable seats so finding a local cinema with sofas was a godsend.  He still ended up stood up at the side inevitably being mistaken for an employee.

I'm still proud of him. I don't know anyone else who endures that kind of pain on a daily basis. This is why the governments overhaul of the benefits system upsets me quite so much. Unless you are disabled or live with someone who is, you don't know the power of "The Brown Envelope" which contains the dreaded ATOS form or an invite to one of their follow up interviews. As I mentioned Dad is never getting better, well baring a miracle or divine intervention, however they don't see it that way. He's been called for the interview/examination twice already this year. It's not a quick, clean and easy process. You get the initial letter, have to fill in quite a probing form, send it off and wait. There is a lot of waiting. In this time, people who don't know you from a stranger in the street are deciding your fate, deciding whether to give you your lifeline, the money keeping you afloat, the money that buys you necessities or in our case, the money that pays for the hundreds of pills he needs to get through the week.

Finally, a little story. I was once hailed a cab and got in, I mentioned I couldn't find the seat belt and the driver couldn't leave until I had it on. "No, the cabbie said, I wouldn't want that incase we have an accident and you end up like one of those cripples. I think they should all be shot. I mean, what good are they doing for the world." He seemed surprised when I unbuckled my belt, told him that my father was disabled and that he most definitely deserved to be alive because me and my family loved and wanted him there and got out. This moment is seared into my memory. A lot needs to be done to change god-awful opinions like his and I think that the paralympics has started to see a shift in attitude. I just hope that it continues.

Our dead are never dead to us, until we have forgotten them.

The elderly of our family seem to die in groups, usually on someones birthday.

I lost my grandmother only a few months ago and it was one of the worst times of my life as we were particularly close. I still catch myself thinking about her as if she's alive.

Granddad died today, on my mothers birthday. He wasn't a very stable influence, coming in and out of our lives on a whim and upsetting Nan. It's hard to mourn for someone you barely knew.

I'm not great at funerals.It's a mix of an avid dislike of crying and my fondness for that slightly dark humour that is generally disapproved of.

My grandmother died after a long battle with cancer and other diseases. Her funeral was a grand two day affair so whilst at The Job From Hell I needed to request these two days off. Most of my bosses were confused as to why I needed both days. I do not recommend using the phrase "Well, she hung around for ages after she was told she was meant to die. We thought we might as well eke out the funeral too" Apparently you get a reputation for being heartless. (I'm not, she would've thoroughly appreciated the sentiment)

In my household death inevitably leads to a discussion on how we'd like to be buried. The general consensus  is that my family are not the type to be buried.
Mum wants to be cremated. There's a dress code but it's not just any dress code. She's amending her will to add that I must rock at least 4" leopard print stilettos even if I'm 80.
Dad informed us as a family he would like to be burn above a bonfire that every guest brings a log to help build. Most people assume this means at a stake like a witch. You'd be wrong; he would like to be strapped to a rocking chair with a device that makes his arm wave. He better start an AXA fund now.

I have terrible luck with job interviews, I hope it's not me, but it's possible.

Since my departure from the Job From Hell I have been doing pretty well getting job interviews which in itself is good. However, I have been getting some very odd people on the other end of the phone.
A few weeks a go I missed a call from a very nice man so I thought I'd give him a ring on the way to my bus.
First mistake.
We were just getting into the important details when he suddenly says
"Are you on a tractor?"
cue stunned silence.
"Errm, no, why?"
"Oh, I thought that was how people from the country got around"
Odd comment aside, I barreled on ahead like a trooper. We got past the normal questions and he asked me about my hobbies which are baking, knitting and snowboarding, just the normal. He took definite interest in this asking me where I go for my knitting supplies as he has a friend and she sells wool. Somehow we got from this to how to knit a floating boat cosy, a bit like a tea-cosy for a barge.I wouldn't recommend getting this far off topic in an interview, you become known as "the knitted boat lady" and remain jobless.

It doesn't get much better in person. I recently went for an interview for a very small company. I was ushered into a very big, white room and told to sit. I sat and waited... and waited... and waited a bit more. The interviewer bustled in, introduced himself and proceeded to say "Now, tell me about your childhood?" I'm not used to thinking that far back so I start to explain my qualifications and early career. He stops me and says "Tell me about your early years.. Were you encouraged? Were your parents good? Were your teachers?"
Now, I don't get flustered easily but this is not what I expected. I nod enthusiastically and agree hoping that will carry things on. No such luck. "I see, now how did you study as a child. Did you like to study as a child? Did your parents help you?" Imagine 45 minutes of questions in a similar vein, followed by one token question about my last job and after one quick handshake I high tailed it out of there. I didn't get the job. I feel like I did get a free psychiatric assessment but I think I failed.

The scouts were right, always be prepared, especially for the unexpected.


So, in summary, a list of what to do for interviews.

1. Go somewhere quiet. Make sure you don't encounter any tractors.
2. Be prepared for odd questions.
3. When faced with an odd question, don't say anything stupid.
4. If you do say anything stupid... please blog about it.
and finally.
5. If they ask you about your childhood, leave. It won't get any better, I assure you.