#slightly unhinged w elizabeth today

[anachrosims]

My job is so fucking thankless. For once I just want to be recognized for the care and effort I put in, instead of it being taken for granted.

People's efforts just to do the basics of a job, especially one that is notoriously difficult, should still be appreciated. Also, having "you get to keep your job" as an "incentive" to work harder than the bare minimum is like "motivating" someone on a tightrope with a pit of spikes and fire. What's the point in doing more than you have to if what you get in return for going ~the extra mile~ and what you get for doing the bare minimum are the exact same thing???

And when you're doing a difficult job, like going across that tightrope and balancing plates, it isn't a moral failing if you can't do it with a smile, and drop plates now and then. But God forbid those metrics slip every so often, when the burnout creeps in while I'm tiptoeing across a fiery pit on a wire with plates in both hands and nothing but a tiny platform and a dark void are waiting for me, offering no comfort because there is no ladder down, I will just have to turn around and do it all again.

God forbid life happens and you're more tired than usual because your car got towed, or your pet is sick, or your chronic health problem is flaring up, so you slip for a week. And while you're trying to balance on that edge, the clowns chastize you, ask you balefully why are you underperforming, what obstacles are you encountering, what difficulties are you having? And you just want to scream, because telling them to open their g-ddamn eyes and look at the view before them isn't an option, so you just smile and tell them your "performance plan" on what you'll do to be better next time, just so you can be left alone to get back to your work. Doing your job sucks, but it's even worse when you're expected to stop in the middle of it and be examined under a spotlight, asked questions that are impossible to answer with real honesty, and held responsible for things outside your control. They're good at making you feel small with their blind incompetence, and the gymnastics you do to make sure you don't end up as another scapegoat would make any acrobat blush.

It doesn't matter that you're a top performer. It doesn't matter that you were set up to fail, with a faulty wire and especially heavy plates, when you first started out. No one blames you for those things and the problems they presented were... somewhat acknowledged. When you brought them up. It doesn't matter how good you are now, because any good you do will be put under a microscope and screamed at by well-paid clowns who stand there just waiting for you to fuck up. And for you, the only thing you can do is to keep moving forward.

If anyone was wondering, that's what my job feels like.