Jobs

So, I'm a writer who doesn't really write much these days, but I've written enough in the past so I don't fall into that "well if you're not writing how can you call yourself a writer?" crap.  God knows I can drink and wallow in depression with the best of them.  A while back I'm thinking, I have to get back to writing, get back to a daily discipline.  Then I'm thinking, so what will I write about; what do I care enough about to write about.  Nothing came to the fore, which is sad, really.  I stopped writing because I became intensely involved in the study of buddhism, going to far as to move to a retreat centre for a while and traveling though Europe and India practicing and studying and, eventually, teaching.  I still do this, and it would be all I do except for the fact that it brings in no money.  Well, some, when you teach, but not enough to buy a meal out in Dublin.  

Back to me having to look for a job and/or getting off my ass and writing more.  To that end I'm applying for technical writing jobs with as much enthusiasm as I can muster.  Which is not much.  I think that may be coming across in the interviews.  Having my portfolio of work trapped in the broken hull of an old laptop isn't helping either.  But damn it's expensive to retrieve information from a dead drive.  One company quoted me 1500 euro.  As if.  I can arrange to send the drive to Belfast and have it retrieved for 500 euro or so, but that still stings.  How much do I want a tech writing job?  I don't know, I have to say.  Sitting around in a too cold or hot office staring at a computer screen and interviewing subject matter experts versus sleeping late and taking long walks in Phoenix Park with the dogs.  Hmmm.

On the writing front, I decided I should start writing something, even if it isn't my magnum opus.  Perhaps erotica.  I can write a titillating sex scene.  I looked at this one site, literotica, and others to see if there is a market out there for sex stories.  Well, there is indeed a market, and if the literotica site is anything to go by, then there are a lot of shockingly untalented writers out there filling it.  I have to admit that I purchased a sexed up Mills and Boone novel to get some idea of what was being sold.  While the sex scenes were laughable and not sexy at all, there was a thriller-like plot that wasn't horrible.  Perhaps a better genre for that writer.  Whatever.  I'm still not writing.

On happier news, for me at least, is that I'm at least getting back to regular exercise that I enjoy – yoga and dance.  I'm attending a regular Tuesday night yoga class and am taking belly dance lessons.  Next monday I start a salsa class with a bunch of middle aged ladies in a Dublin suburb.  I'm quite looking forward to it.

Oy, Ireland

So I live in Ireland, in Dublin to be specific.  I'm not Irish, I'm American, but my husband's Irish and he was the one with a job when we married.  "So, how do you like Ireland?" is a question I get a lot.  "Oh, its lovely." or, "Oh, it's grand." is the usual answer, sort of showing that I'm slightly acclimating to the culture.  My old answer used to be "Well, Ireland seems lovely, but Dublin is a hell-hole."  You see the Irish really don't tell you how they feel, exactly, especially if it's negative.  

It's been an interesting lesson to learn.  Generally Americans express their ideas and opinions freely, happily arguing their case for hours and leave on friendly terms, even if the person they have been arguing with has completely different ideas.  It can be fun.  Not so here.  If you even question (in a curious, non-aggressive manner) what someone says you are considered a threat.  Sure, there are great conversations at dinner or at a pub, but always about something else.  Politics, sure, let me tell you exactly how Fianna Fail has ruined this country.  Speak out on a national level and actually try to do something about it?  Ah, what good would that do now?

Of course actually try to plan something and discuss ideas for something that could actually happen and you're in for a spot of trouble.  Chances are there will be one person who already has a strong agenda, and he's spent time lobbying others in the group to his side: making phone calls, meeting for a pint, taking in a game; that sort of this.  And all before any discussion has taken place.  So, you in the first meeting and Mr. Agenda's plan is rolled out, possibly not even by him.  Hmm, you wonder, sounds good, but what about this point?  How about considering this?  But what you don't realize is that this isn't up for discussion.  In fact your move to begin a discussion is considered a threat.  From that moment on you are a threat and moves are made to either discredit you, and this can get nasty.  Fun, no?  

I held the idea that transparency, open discussion and working together – as peers, as engaged people – would create something great, an excellent outcome.  I held this as fact, that this was the best way to work together, but I've found out that there's a few out there that really don't agree.  

OK, so clearly this isn't about the Irish, this is about one group of people that I've had to work with that have made my life hell.  You can kick me in the ass for my prejudicial statements.  I need to get out more and meet people besides those in this little dysfunctional group.

Sad

The news of David Foster-Wallace's suicide really threw me today.  It's deeply sad for his family and friends, I'm sure, but it illuminates the delicacy of one's own existence, the frailty of one's mental health.  I have to wonder what led him to take his life.  To me, he seemed to have an ideal existence:  a published and lauded writer, married, teaching in a small, exclusive school.  Where was his gap, his despair?  Was it depression or a confluence of things?  Did his brilliant mind burn him out with its relentlessness?  My thoughts are with his family.  Death penetrates so deeply, and while things seem the same outwardly, inwardly we are changed forever; becoming gentler, wiser, sadder.

The hippie co-op

This morning I went to the organic co-op to get tomatoes (which are just now coming ripe in Ireland).  I go about once a month because it's a bit a way from our house and any longer excursion onto Dublin roads can be an interesting, and life threatening, venture.  The co-op is wonderful with it's pudgy organic food, wonderfully seasonal, and it's warm vendors.  The issue is some of the members.  Many of the people you see shopping are dressed in hemp, rosy cheeked if younger, pleasantly weathered faces if older.  Now I imagine many of these people have serious spiritual and environmental ideals, ideals that promote being mindful of how we treat and interact with others and the environment, and yet they wander about the hall like automatons.  

Silly, naive me, to expect people to be mindful and polite just because their proclaiming health and indulging in alternative lifestyles.  Shove me in the back with a shopping cart and continue to blather on your cell phone without an acknowledgement or an apology.  Check.  Wander about aimlessly not caring who you knock into.  Check.  Stand there staring blankly while your teenager shoves in front of the line.  Check.  Have a 15 minute debate with the wine man while other people are waiting to pay.  Check.  Let you children run up and down the wooden ramp, the thuds of which, and the shrieking of whom reverberate though the hall.  Check.  Have impassioned conversation about who's screwing up the peat bogs or how Lidl and Aldi are the devils henchmen.  Yup.  I could blame it on the hippies, but the upscale food hall in the city centre is the same rude mess.

Again

So yesterday was OK.  I got a few things done, was feeling content, had a great yoga class, was pleased that the dog we're fostering is settling in.  So what happened.  Well we went out to a pub to hear music and I managed to drink three massive glasses of wine in an hour and a half, and then come home and have some Vodka while watching crap television until 3am.  So, of course today I feel wretched and I've put a spanner in my small progress and in my dieting, which has been sucking this week anyway.  Should I just stop drinking?  Yes.  Do I want to?  Nooooo.  So therein lies a big problem.  What do I want more, a life or some gleeful numbing?  Stay tuned.

Anyway, I've been obsessed with weight loss blogs of late, trying to find one that inspires me.  Most of them are people's food journals:  I ate this and this and then I did some exercise.  Others seem like they're priming themselves for a book deal.  They might be interesting to a point, but don't quite seem honest.  My guilty pleasures are the ones that have taken the Onion creation Jean Teasdale as a life model.  I was considering making this a weight loss blog, and have other blogs for other areas of my life, but why compartmentalize?  Even if no one reads this, let me be honest with myself about the facets of my personality.

Here we go

I'm a writer who doesn't write much any more, and who is rather secretive, so a blogs a great idea, right?  I also have a load of other shit going on.  I have my focus on loosing weight, as I've been fat most of my life and am just damn tired of it (and of a few other addictive tendencies).  I am trying to surf the waves of my wild, groundless spiritual path and I'm trying to make some kind of life in a country that's not my own -- a country with rocky soil that it's proving difficult to put down roots in.  Oh, and I'm trying to find a real job.  One that pays.   So, fun.  The idea is I'll write of my progress, write down my thoughts, my successes and struggles.  I'll commit to this odd format my musings, myself.  Anonymously I'm afraid.  Secrecy doesn't dissolve so easily.  But most importantly of all, I'll write.

Wish me luck.