Getting fired

I’ve been fired from two different jobs in my life. The first time I got fired from a burrito bar for pulling a prank on my boss. (No regrets, it was a really funny prank). The second time was 2 weeks ago just as the last year ended and a new one began to emerge.

I was working as a bartender in a casino. My boss said that he was looking for somebody more “bubbly”. I wanted to tell him about how the kids at camp call me Munter, how I’d stay up to tell them stories about made up pigs with three legs in funny accents. But I didn’t.  He said they were really looking for someone who was less cold. I wanted to tell him about why I became a social worker. That I wasn’t made to serve the wealthy their drinks while they gambled, I was made to serve the poor. That I’m here to help the people who can never seem to help themselves. But I didn’t. Instead I excused myself to use the bathroom and I laughed and laughed until my eyes were wet, delirious with gratitude, and thought about our inability to liberate ourselves from the unhappiness in our lives.

My new years resolution is to stop wasting valuable time. To stop getting so hungover that I can’t function for full days. To stop binge watching TV. To stop working dead end jobs when I know that’s not who I want to be. To stop making decisions based on other people. To stop being content with being miserable. To stop being helpless.

We don’t have the right to feel helpless. We don’t have the right because we aren’t helpless. I should have quit that job weeks before I was fired. I should have found another way. Why are we always waiting for someone to set us free? For someone to make us happy or make us whole? Why are we always waiting for opportunity to happen and when are we going to realise that the opportunity is us. It always has been. We are the potential, we are the change.

When are we going to learn that we can save ourselves?

All my love,

Maeve