Nothing Makes Me Want to Drive Off a Bridge More than My Job

 TL;DR: I've gotten to the point that I hate my job so much I think I might actually lose my fucking mind and it's made even worse by the fact that I'm essentially stuck with it for the next couple years (unless I want to be homeless).

Forewarning: This post is a lot of whining about things that are my own fault and no one can really do anything about but me. But the time for the easy changes is well behind me and while I've begun working on the hard way of doing things (yet again), I'm not sure I how much more energy I have in me for it. I know the "American way" is to just shut up and deal with it, but that's just not my style. Anyways...

Most days, I get to work crossing the A street bridge and on many of those days, I imagine seeing if I can't just drive off that bridge and avoid ever having to go to work again. But then I remember for however much I hate my job, I don't actually hate my life and it's just not worth dying merely so I don't have to go to work. So I go to work and just pray for the clock to keep on moving until I'm home again.

Now I've been known to criticize my work for being absolutely mindless, and it is. I'm pretty sure we could train monkeys to do 90% of my job. (Coincidentally, I think the job of training those monkeys would be absolutely fascinating and would love to be a part of that team). But that merely makes me dislike my job, not hate it. After all, a good portion of jobs out there are boring and even the best jobs have their dull moments, so letting the work itself control how I feel about my job would be redundant. My grievance now comes from my rank and how I'm treated, which in the military is often a direct reflection of rank.

Story time: Three years ago I was an E-6 (Tech Sergeant) that had developed a habit of failing his PT tests (which is a whole other sordid story). I was told if I failed my next test, I would be demoted to E-5 (Staff Sergeant). And of course, I failed that test (by .2 points!). That failure happened in April and it took until October to actually do the demotion, which was incredibly frustrating in and of itself (especially as I actually passed another PT test while waiting for the demotion). But when the commander demoted me, he said as soon as I passed two consecutive PT tests that he would give me E-6 back and that the PT test I recently passed counted towards that. "No problem," I thought. So while being back to E-5 sucked, I did it to myself so I couldn't be that mad about it and it looked like it wouldn't be for that long anyways.

(Side note: I'm in a position that's known as "dual status," meaning I'm both civilian and military. Most the time I'm considered civilian, but I have to wear the military uniform with my corresponding rank on it. It's a stupid system, but I'm in no position to change it).

My civilian job was graded as a GS-9, but it's military equivalent was supposed to be an E-7. However, an E-6 was allowed to fill that role, which I did. As an E-5, technically I wasn't supposed to be in that job. But due to all the legalese of government jobs, it would take a hell of a lot of paperwork to get me out of the job. So my boss asked me to volunteer to switch from the GS-9 job to a WG-10 job. He said by doing so I would actually get a pay raise (despite the GS-9 position being a higher "rank" than the WG-10 position). I agreed to do so, only to find out I actually got a pay decrease. Now eventually I should be making more as a WG-10, but I still ended up missing out on about $8000 over two years because of that switch. If this shit happened with a civilian company, I'd have pretty good grounds for a lawsuit (not counting the fact that my dumbass just trusted these people and didn't make sure to get anything in writing). But that's not even the big sore point for me - it's the rank.

I passed that next PT test in March 2020 and instead of getting E-6 back, I was told they read the regulations wrong and I had to wait two years before I could get my rank back. That sucked, but I figured I could tough it out. Then when that two years was coming close, I was told they were going to wait longer. At first, they said they were going to give the rank to someone else and then give me E-6 back through some other promotion system. I was pissed, but there was nothing I could do. And then it became that they wanted to see my work performance improve. Something that was never a stipulation before, but apparently because we got a couple new people that were rock stars, they wanted to see me up my game too.

I get what some people will say, that they have the right to do that and I need to improve my performance, but fuck that and fuck them too. I'm too fucking tired for this shit. When you make a deal with someone, you need to stick to the original terms of that deal. The change to having to wait two years was supposedly outside of anyone's control, but everything else is within their control. 

Going to work as the old, crusty E-6 isn't grand, but it's not uncommon and I was OK with it. No one takes an old, crusty E-5 seriously. And in the military, all anyone sees is your rank. Even people that knew you at your old rank only see you as your current rank. So to be my age and have my experience and still be an E-5 is a fucking insult. Which I've always known, but somehow today while I was doing work normally reserved for much younger and lower ranking guys it really sank in. 

I could probably go on for way too long, but this is already longer than most people will read and I'm just too fucking tired.

Things I Don't Really Miss About Drinking

 Lately I find myself really missing beer. A lot. Like I’m not sure how much longer this “quitting” drinking thing can last. But I do know I need it to last at least as long as it takes for me to get to a doctor to get a liver function test done (I’m a bit paranoid of how much damage I may have done already). But if the news is really good or really bad, I don’t see any reason to worry about my liver, at least not in the present. However, I still haven’t made an appointment and so as far as I know, my liver is in the danger zone and I can’t risk making it worse. Which means missing beer is not at all a good thing.

So I’m trying to remind myself of the things I absolutely don’t miss about drinking.

Number one is hangovers. I mean, it’d be kinda weird if I did miss those, yes-no? No matter how tired (and sometimes sore) I wake up these days, I still always feel a thousand times better than whenever I’ve awoken hungover. I no longer spend the first half of my work day regretting drinking the night before and the second half of that day just watching the clock until I can get home and drink again. And that alone feels great. It also helps me a ton in being ready to work when I get to work (surprise, surprise), so I’m not feeling like a complete piece of shit just sitting there avoiding work.

Closely related to the hangover (and almost always a part of having a hangover) is "beer shits" and I’m so happy to not be dealing with that as well. I won’t go into a ton of discussion on it; if you’ve never dealt with beer shits in life then all the more power to you. But the fact that my stomach feels so much better than it did during my drinking days makes me wonder how I ever allowed that to be my norm in the first place. It’s also incredibly nice not having to worry about my proximity to a toilet for the first half (or more) of any given day.

And even if I’m not hungover or battling with my bowels, most days after drinking I felt sluggish, both mentally and physically, and I definitely don’t miss that. The inability to maintain focus on even simple tasks often had me falsely promising myself I was going to take it easy with the drinking for awhile (even though deep down I knew the reality was I’d most likely be pouring myself a drink as soon as I was able).

I also don’t miss being drunk. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy a good buzz as much as most people – but being actually drunk was a crap shoot to how I was going to feel. For as often as I was in a “I love everyone” mood, there were plenty of nights where I hated myself/my life and lamented the fact I was ever born. As much fun as an “I love everyone” night can be, those nights really don’t make up for nights of alcohol induced grief where one isn’t thinking anything through rationally. And it certainly never made me more artistic, despite the fact I often imagined when I was feeling sad at least it was helping me get in touch with my creative side. I guess on the plus side I’ve never really been one for being an angry drunk (unless you count yelling at video games, but I’ve done that plenty of times sober too); who knows how miserable my life would be if that were the case?

So yeah, I miss beer. But I didn’t make the decision to stop drinking because I dislike beer – it was because all those things that I don’t miss were really messing with my life in a bad way.  

I know some people will recommend non-alcoholic beers to me and I’m sure you mean well, but when I say I miss beer, I mean real beer. Beers full of flavor, like stouts meant to be drank at room temperature and IPAs that can actually quench thirst on a warm day. Every NA beer I’ve ever tried was modeled after mass-produced beers that I never really enjoyed. And I’m not trying to be a snob about it, I fully feel people should drink what they enjoy regardless of what’s popular at the moment, but I’ve long since gotten myself to the point that it’s craft beer or no beer for me. And right now, sadly, it’s just no beer.