[OMG! I finally have a post Idea]
So, classes have been out for three weeks now. I feel like I’ve complained about this before, but I’m taking the Summer “off” just to work and it is KICKING MY BUTT. The week before finals I ended up working 11 hours overtime, I took my final exams off so I could just take my exams and then crawl back into bed, and then my summer hell began.
After finals I was scheduled to work eight days in a row. The schedule is made weekly so I don’t think this was malicious at all and more of my boss going “F*ck, I’m ten people under-staff and the redhead is the only employee I trust”. At first I was like, “It’s cool, It’s cool. I just had finals off. I’m well rested.” So I worked my eight days, the last of which was a special catering event that was really fun to work. Eight days in a row is actually pretty normal because that usually leads up to a three-day weekend! Boom! Three days of solid videogames and no homework. Yes!
Then the next week schedule came out and I was working seven days in a row. This was much harder. Plus we had a major thunderstorm on the sixth day that knocked out the power for at least 5 hours. I work at a grocery store. Losss of power is REALLY, REALLY bad. We had to close the store and customers were like “don’t you have a generator?” and I’m like, “Yes, we do. That’s why we still have emergency lights and the bathrooms still work.” Seriously? This kind of storm only happens once a year so why would be have a super-mega generator that we don’t even NEED 364 days a year? Fuel? Upkeep? Matenence? No thank you, we’ll take the loss of profit. It’s cheaper.
So because we lost power we loss refigeration and ALL perishables had to go into crates and on to refrigerated trucks. All employees on staff lined up and we just went department by department by department. It was actually kind of fun because we got to (briefly) see what some of the other departments had. All the “I didn’t know we had X” reactions were amusing. Before we went home for the night my boss asked for volunteers to come in at 4AM to put everything back with the promise of overtime and I was like “No, thank you. I’m good.” But the folks who did come in did a fantastic job because they got everything back on the shelves by 6AM when the store opened and then they went home for a few hours and then CAME BACK to close. Since none of us were running on all cylinders that day we didn’t get out until midnight.
So, I’m very tired, but here’s why being aro/ace is extreamly advantatious. All my coworkers in my same age bracket are tired AND married. I can’t even imagine having to do all this nonsense and then having to go home to someone at the end of the day and work my schedule around them. One of my coworkers is married to a nurse and she works three twelve hour shifts a week. They have schedule clashes. He works weekends, plus school, and she doesn’t. My schedule is so tight right now I don’t even have time to write a grocery list. If I need to pick up something I’ll write it on my arm and pick it up after work.
I’ve mentioned before that I’m debt free. I paid off all my school loans in two years because of the AmeriCorps programs, but another reason I got to do that was I was single at the time. I could take off at the drop of the hat and work in a new state for a while and come back. I remember some of the other Corps members at the time trying to keep up their relationships at the time and it really didn’t work. There were sooo many breakups including some broken engagements. I never had to worry about that. I didn’t know I was aro/ace at the time, but in retrospect it really was a blessing.
Being single is kind of lonely especially with all the romantic media thrown in my face all the time, but without relationships causing complications I’m really much further in life than I would be other wise. I have a college degree and I have a good job that pays above minimum wage and gives me discounts on groceries. I was able to do the AmeriCorps programs without worrying about how it would affect my relationships and get out of my student debt.
Relatively speaking, I’ve got it made. I probably have a skewed view on relationships because I usually just hear the complaints without the perks, but right now being able to put myself first is a huge plus. Right now I would rather have the flexibility of being single with the option of changing my mind later on.
A³ 