On the subject of working

I have a job. Like most people my age, at least the people that I know, I don't have a career. This is due is most part to the fact that I don't know what I would want to do as a career. I know many people who knew what they wanted to do before going to college or university; my friend M. knew when we were children that he wanted to be a weather man. He went to university and did physics and atmospheric science, and now he is a meteorologist, which is even better than being just a weather man, because at least M. knows more than fuck all about weather.

As for myself and S., we had our interests and pursued them in university. We both have arts degrees, and S. in fact has a master's degree. I don't know if I believe it when people say you can't get a good job with an arts degree (myself, I have a degree in English). I maintain that people like S. and I, and many others, followed our interests and never had a clear cut path for what we wanted to do in life. And without that, it's difficult to know what to look for.

Occasionally I have the feeling that I made a huge mistake studying literature, and that maybe I should have parlayed my love of language into studying linguistics and picking up another language along the way, something to add to my fluency in English and French. My parents put me into French immersion when I was four, believing that a second language would be an asset later in life. By the time I hit university I found that most of my peers were all at least fluent in two, or maybe three or even four, languages.

Even more so than thinking I should have studied something other than literature, I wonder if I should have studied something like human resources management or administrative studies, or gone to a career college and mastered the art of real-time court reporting. Something dull, but sensible and realistic.

However, I have a job, and that is enough for now but I am constantly looking for something better. I work as a telephone interviewer for a large academic research facility. I would like to stress that I don't do telemarketing or market research. Most of the work we do is in partnership with other groups of researchers, including universities across Canada and various health agencies. Sometimes I find it frustrating work, occasionally I find it interesting and from time to time even rewarding.

On the whole, though, I find I don't generally like talking to people on the phone
but have learned what to say and how to speak so that people are less likely to hang up on me immediately. I can't, however, do the sugary bubble voice that many of the other girls in the office seem to have mastered. I used to think that no one would ever want to talk to someone who sounds like that, but miraculously enough these girls manage to spend the entire evening on the phone, with their "sweetie" and high-pitched laughs. I don't know who could put up with that for the entire length of a survey. I can't bring myself to talk like that.

Work is sometimes harder because of my moods. If I'm in a low mood, I find it more difficult to tolerate the people I have to speak with. From time to time I have the shining opportunity to speak with someone intelligent, but for the most part I get stuck with hicks, bitchy moms with kids screaming in the background, elderly people who are racist (particularly when we discuss things like safe driving; most people who are baby boomers or older seem to think that all bad drivers are new immigrants, who not only drive poorly but are the cause of all our traffic problems), and 19 or 20 year olds who say, "Iyunno," to every question. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, today's young people have become so lazy that they don't even bother to pronounce the "d" in "I dunno".

But, as my young cousin explained to me via a post on Facebook, sometimes you just say, "I dunno" because you don't feel like thinking. I feel it's a proud moment for women and girls everywhere.

Going back to my lack of enjoyment in my job, I realize that it isn't a particularly glamourous job, and that people probably don't treat me as nice as they possibly could because of the sheer fact that I am calling them on the phone to talk to them about something that they might not have an interest in. Regardless of the fact that the purpose of an academic research study is often important, a lot of people just don't care, and even if they do deign to speak to someone like me, a lot of the time they aren't very polite.

I can understand this, but I think that it says a lot about a person. Even before I worked as a telephone interviewer, I always treated telemarketers, researchers, etc. with kindness, regardless of whether I was interested or not. I listened to what they had to say, never yelled, and answered whatever questions I could. I never bought anything, but would listen to sales pitches. It's just common decency, and I like to consider myself a decent, if not a nice, person. S. says that I am cynical but compassionate. I think this is an apt description.

I have to admit that my job has taught me a bit about people skills. I have had to learn what to say to people to make them interested, and make myself sound like someone they would want to talk about. This may sound horrible, but as I learned once in a bartending class, anything remotely related to customer service (and my current job often reminds me of past jobs I have had in customer service) is all about a smile and a big, fucking act.