Change.

Once again, after an extended and unplanned hiatus, I'm back and posting again. I've noticed that only two blogs on my list have even been active in the past year, so I guess I don't feel so bad for slacking... if I can even call it that. The truth of the matter is that sitting down and writing this blog is a true pleasure for me. It's something I enjoy, and like to think I do quite well. In the past while I got my writing kicks from posting little quips on Facebook, but the status bar was really not designed for extended monologuing, and I've had a lot of things on my mind.

Today, I'd like to talk about the difficulties of changing.

Now, as I'm sure I've mentioned in previous posts, I am a staunch advocate of personal growth and improvement. I've spent the past couple years really looking at myself and trying to make better what I see. I'd like to think I've been quite successful in that regard; I'm happily single for the first time in my life (and not just kidding myself this time), I've made leaps and bounds with regards to my social anxiety, and I've crossed a lot of thresholds in my personal life, that I was never quite sure I could.

That said, I still do have some things to work out. I still have a metabolism that stunts my ability to have a normal social life, and there's really no end in sight where that's concerned. I've been told I don't have hyperthyroidism, but I have a friend who was told the same thing, and we're both displaying numerous symptoms, not just the increase in appetite. I'm considering a naturopath, or maybe just a second opinion would do.

Beyond that, there's another big problem that I've got to come to terms with. It's something that's put me in the not-so-good graces of my current, and previous employer. Now, let me start at the beginning. In 2003, my graduating year, it occurred to Mrs. Smith, the best teacher at my high school, that I was an extremely slow reader. I mentioned how late I was up every night working on homework (usually 2-3am) and we got some tests underway. I was given special leniency when it came to the English provincials, and that was the last I thought of it for many years. Now, I've been considered a pretty slow worker at just about every job I've had; I was let go after a week of dishwashing, I was never called back after a week of labour working for my Dad, and everywhere else, I've just gotten a lot of harassment about my pace. Now, a lot of that, I think, can be chalked up to low energy levels... which has just become a norm for my life. I've had people admit before that they assumed I was perpetually stoned because I'm so chill. Lack of sleep can account for a lot of it, but I think that the lion's share is the result of my day to day lifestyle. I need to push myself to be active if I ever want to be consistently energetic.

But it's more that just the energy thing... at my last job, I was a cashier, and I would always be hounded for processing sales too slowly. However, when it came to the end of the night? Perfect cash-out. Almost without fail. So what's the problem here? I sacrifice speed for accuracy. Do you want the job done fast, or do you want it done right? I've never had the slightest success while rushing a job, and if I can stay within my limits, not only will the finished product be superb, but I will not have stressed, at all. But we all know the world doesn't work like that. Nobody wants to pay you overtime, and no one can risk the liability of allowing you to work off the clock (even if you are okay working for nothing). About a year ago, my old boss called me up to the office and informed me that a customer complaint had been filed against me. I had failed to ask some lady how her day was, and I then had the nerve to neglect to offer her a shopping bag for her things. I was suspended from work for a week. I then came back to 10 hour workweeks, down from 35. I began looking for work, all the while trying to make things work with the job I had... I was a little shocked. What an overreaction! Things continued like this for about a month, when my employer finally figured he couldn't dodge severance with me (a common strategy for the Rootcellar... don't let anyone tell you that a ma' & pa' business will be a better job than a corporate one) and finally gave me the axe. What was I to make of this? For the first while, I was fully content to believe their batshit crazy reason for firing me... poor customer service. Sure.

But now that I'm running into problems at my current job, it's starting to make a lot more sense. My old boss was looking for an excuse to fire his slowest employee.

Here's how the story goes from his perspective: Hiring a new cashier, at about a dollar above starting pay, because as a recent manager, he's clearly overqualified. New cashier picks up the duties and price codes reasonably quickly, so all is well... but after about two years, the cash manager finally gives him his 6 month review (lol) and all of a sudden, everyone notices that he's still working at the same pace as a newbie. This isn't good, get the managers to talk to him about it. That'll work. Okay, we've had a lot of cashier turnover now, and this guy actually has considerable seniority... and we need more supervisors. Maybe if we give him limited authority and hint that a cushier position is available, he'll be motivated to work at it... ah, this isn't working, let's demote him. This is a lost cause... if only I had some excuse to cut his hours and make him quit... what's this? Customer complaint? Bingo!

So there you go... still a little crooked, but truth be told, I'm a problem worker, and a significant part of the problem is my meticulous nature. I work in produce now, and that's an even bigger problem... whenever a display looks bad, or some product is going off, I'm compelled to deal with it. If it's a couple of ratty looking bunches of spinach, I've just gotta go to the back and sort them into better looking bunches. And I don't feel like I'm being unreasonable here... we don't have the freshest produce around. I've definitely had people ask where a product is, only to point it out, do a double take, and then tell them they can have it for half price, if they really want it, otherwise, I'm just going to throw it out, because it's practically compost. I feel like I'm the only person there that takes pride in the quality of the things we sell, but I have my boss and the other produce staff telling me not to be so particular, and to just get the stuff out as fast as possible. I was complaining to a friend about this the other day, saying I'm too OCD to do things as quickly and poorly as is expected of me, and she said I should just be less OCD about it... at which point I thought "Well, if I could be less OCD, then it wouldn't be OCD, would it?"

...and that's when it hit me: People say OCD these days like it isn't even a thing... but it's a real mental disorder... and what if I'm actually diagnosable? You hear about extreme cases, and I don't think I really fit the bill for some of the repetitive action symptoms, but just look at this situation. I can't bring myself to half ass it at work. It takes so much willpower for me to even get through a section without checking every little thing for spoilage, and when I do just go nuts and pull the skin off of every onion, I find a dozen bad ones, and that just reinforces the idea that the way I'm doing it is the right way...
I don't know now... is it that I actually have a disorder, or is it that I'm just so fucking stubborn? Because I feel like that plays a part, too. At this job and my last I justified my sluggish pace with the refrain "I get results!" and became so rigid in the belief that my weakness was a strength. When it comes right down to it, I'm proud of how precise I am in my actions, and I don't want to change something I'm proud of. I feel like I could change if I wanted to.
If I wanted to.



On a side note, it has come to my attention that a friend of a friend of mine knows me as "the guy with that hilarious blog"... now, I don't know if I should take that as a success or a failure. I mean, I'm flattered that someone enjoys the things I write, but at the same time, it sounds like that's all I've got going for me. Maybe I should get out more.