stereotypical single woman

After a couple of stressful of nights of going back and forth I’ve decided that I’m not going to accept either the Tulsa or Kentucky jobs.

* Note - the rest is somewhat whiney and melodramatic. You might want to stop here*

I didn’t accept the for lots of reasons, but the main one being that neither of them were worth moving away from my family. The money just wasn’t that great, better than I’m making right now, but not significantly so. Each department had it’s pros and cons - which is par for the course, no job is perfect. Adding to that I really didn’t like either of the areas, and I’m terrified of the Staten Island debacle happening all over again. I’ve reached a point in my life where a job is a job, some are better than others, but that’s all it is to me. And when it comes right down to it, I don’t know if I want this type of job anymore. But it’s all I’m trained to do so I had to do it, right?

*Seriously, I told you that you didn’t want to read this part*

Honestly, I’m also scared of the stress involved in this kind of job. In the year I’ve taken off I’ve become more relaxed now that I ever have been in my life - scary, huh? The last two productions I worked on tore me to bits emotionally and psychologically and lead to a nice little breakdown. I worked myself day and night to put nice costumes on stage and it looked like crap. Yes, there were all kinds of forces working against me. Logically I know this. Even with all the know-how, ambition, and planning there are only 24 hours in a day and seven days in a week to get done what needs to get done. I was working 40 hours a week at my day job, going to the theatre after work, with no workable costume shop to speak of, trying to put the same quality of costumes that are in my portfolio on stage. Obviously I couldn’t. But it still took me months to get over the failure, and when it comes right down to it I’m scared of getting put in that situation again. No one is more critical of me than I am, and I had already dragged myself down for not being a superhuman and getting what I wanted on stage, but hearing what other people were saying about me still stung like you wouldn’t believe. I can take constructive criticism. But it wasn’t. It made me want to crawl in a hole and never show my face in the theatre community here again. At least when something like that happens here I have my family as a support system, and they have been wonderful.

*See, I told you I was whining*

On the plus side I’m not taking this decision as an admission of failure on my part, but as a realization of my limitations and priorities. It’s reassuring to know what you are capable of and what type of situation is needed for you to succeed. It’s also very nice to be able to recognize situations that have a high probability of failure and heartache and to have the good sense to avoid them when you can. Not to mention that knowing you will be around for at least your neice’s second year of life is worth more than any raise they could have offered me.