coffeeandcontradictions

[coffeeandcontradictions]

[coffeeandcontradictions]

How come I googled the job and still didn’t get it?

I think we’ll go for a comparative angle for this post. As in I’ll compare the logical and dignified response to being rejected from a job against a more emotional and comfort eating response, so my response.

This blog is about honesty, and bluntness and not hiding the hardship of ‘first world problems’. Because I know that my life isn’t over because I didn’t get this job, and I know there are worse positions to be in. It’s like when Nan’s say ‘you don’t know how good you’ve got it, you didn’t live through rationing during the war.’ Well, I know I didn’t experience that, I mean seriously, I just drove to ASDA under the guise of ‘buying my boyfriend a selection of Easter Eggs for making his life so difficult with my constant unemployed rants’ and somehow miraculously ended up eating a Malteser egg and the included Malteser chocolates on the 27th March. Eg. NOT AN ACCEPTABLE EASTER DATE. One positive came out of this, I wasn’t sat in my car this time, however I was watching Location…so the lesser of the two unemployed evils. But yes, I know I haven’t experienced horrific periods of history, I know my parents are saving my life by keeping a roof over my head, but it’s just sad and annoying and frustrating and every other adjective which connotes being fed up isn’t it? 

So let’s get back to comparing the dignified and the disastrous. 

The grown up attitude to rejection;

-Remain upbeat and genuinely appreciative on the telephone to the company telling you that you nailed all aspects of the interview but they’ve decided to go with someone who has more experience. Accept this, agree that you weren’t experienced enough. 

- Immediately create a new plan. Begin searching for suitable jobs again with a fresh mindset and appreciate the beauty of fresh starts, or something cheesy and Instagram quote worthy like that. 

- Accept the companies answer about your interview. That is was as good as it could have been. Take comfort in being told you were confident and did all you could have. Use this to help with any self-esteem and confidence issues you’ve been facing whilst job hunting. 

The less dignified response, also known as my reaction; 

- Remain (falsely) upbeat and positive on the phone as you’re told you have been ‘unsuccessful this time’, (doesn’t that make it sound like there’s another shot at the title?) Break down silently in your brain and try really really hard to not let your overly positive ‘Oh that’s a shame’ tone crack on the line. 

- Type the word ‘graduate’ into your chosen job site. See nothing on page 1, proceed to type in ‘job’, before realising you’re in a negative head space. 

-Realise you have known the solution to negative head spaces and general negative situations in life all this time; Netflix, tea and chocolate. Unfortunately nearly have a less than silent meltdown in kitchen when you remember you don’t live in a household where there is a chocolate drawer or snack cupboard. Drive to ASDA under the pretence of Easter gift buying, returning with an egg for yourself. It’s essential to eat it all, mainly as a coping mechanism and to get rid of the evidence of this beast-like behaviour. 

- Over analyse the conversation about why you didn’t get the job. Internally question what more you could have done (despite being told you did an excellent job). People who do excellent jobs get the job though don’t they? Don’t accept compliment’s, it’s a trap, lulling you into a feeling of accomplishment. Accomplishment without a job at the end of it, yippeeeee. 

As a side note, because I hope it’s clear by now that this blog is satirical, mostly sarcastic, but heartfelt and sometimes brutal about how I feel during this time I’m spending in limbo. I want it to make people laugh, sometimes at me, other times with me.  Right now I’ve just clocked on that I ate the Easter egg wearing full gym kit. I’m talking full thermal under armour and Nike leggings complete with faded tick. This is so tragic that it’s funny, and not even the ‘laugh or you’ll cry funny, it’s made me smile. My friends and families’ choruses of ‘It wasn’t meant to be’, ‘we’re proud of you anyway’ and my favourite, ‘Oh for fuck sake their loss!’, cushions the blow massively. 

Being rejected from jobs you didn’t have that genuine interest in is one thing, but this is the first time in a while where I’d envisioned myself in a job and imagined what I could contribute and benefit from by working there. I got a little ahead of myself maybe, envisioning what bag I’d buy next month or even more exciting, the prospect of booking a holiday. And even more exciting than that, the ability to begin saving for a house again. The reality of an unemployed graduates life for me is the freezing of plans, the halting of ideas and adventures you want to go on. Not being able to treat the people you love to nice things. It doesn’t sound that bad on paper, perhaps it sounds a little ‘poor me’, ‘I want a holiday’, ‘I want to buy handbags’, but if you’re in the same boat, or same fiat 500 with one bar of petrol left as me you understand. It’s your independence which suffers, your idea that the world is your oyster diminishes a little. Because oysters are expensive and the world shockingly doesn’t offer free travel from one side to the other, funny that. 

I usually have a witty sign off but I’m feeling a bit gutted, you know if ‘bit’ was another word for ‘massively’. The last thing I want this blog to become is a ‘pity me page’. But by being open and honest with the few people who may have come across these writings I hope it can create a narrative between those who are experiencing similar troubles to me. Ending on the most cliched quote possibly of all time, every cloud has a silver lining. The silver lining to this day for me is I got some writing material out of it, who knows maybe in a perfect world I’d get a job writing about not having a job. Then eating Easter eggs in thermal leggings at half three on a Monday won’t seem so bad. 

Rachael 

[coffeeandcontradictions]

Skill (singular)  - Can make tea to a high standard.

Do employers commend a candidate (the word candidate is used very loosely as that suggests that I am in the running, I did brag about my Microsoft Word skills though), who applies a subtle begging tone to their applications. And when I say subtle I mean I end the email with, 'hopefully you will take a chance on me and trust that I will learn quickly how to input data of  something into a database of something else, oh and I’m really friendly and make good tea, bye’.

I’m considering making the subject of my emails to employers a simple one-worded ‘NEEDY’ in capital letters. I mean, it catches the readers eyes and attention, tick. It’s short, snappy and creative (all adjectives trendy, cool and quirky businesses gravitate towards), tick. A sleazy business man might open it by accident with the hope of an entirely different kind of email altogether. I can hope, but I think that’s quite a tragic way to hope even for me. 

If your emails, cover letters or application forms ever come across as ‘need me, want me, hire me’, I think my advice is to close the laptop and make that class cup of tea you know you can make. But just make it for yourself. Not to impress anyone, or sell yourself short, because you know deep down your’e so much more than a good brew. (Even if your fail safe method should be world renowned, or at least Wales renowned. **** See end of rant for tea method *****)

 It’s so important to understand when to stop aimlessly clicking ‘Apply’. It’s so easy to do though. Today it’s been niggling at me that it’s been a whole month since I quit my job. I miss the kids, I miss some people dearly, I miss the purpose and, like every modern women I miss the feeling of making my own money. Oh the money. I applied for a competition today to win a months worth of Costa coffee, last month I was throwing Millionaire Shortbread and Cappuccino’s about like they were going out of fashion.  I am now the budget queen, but am also panicking over the fact that I haven’t had a job for four weeks. It doesn’t actually sound so bad written down but it feels like a forever ago. I think it’s important to tell you, and more importantly myself that this panic cannot dictate the speed at which you/I apply for jobs. Take your time, drink your tea, watch Location, and maybe start selling your belongings on Ebay; but that can begin tomorrow. 

**** MY TEA METHOD ****

- Boil Kettle (obviously)

-Tea bag in mug 

- Boiling water in

- Milk in (personal preferences are respected) 

- Squish tea bag super hard against side of mug to smush all the tea juice out of bag and make tea the colour of blood 

- Add sugar if you’re not sweet enough

Rachael 

[coffeeandcontradictions]

What did you give up for Lent? My income and with it any sense of freedom.

Whatever the job, whatever the hours, whatever the level of dread you feel getting up in the morning, there is something a job will always guarantee (whether its minimum wage or enough to go globe-trotting every other month) of course, money. Even if your job is boring you, making you cry like someone who needed their roots done the wrong side of February (that was a personal attack on myself), is not challenging you, it still allows you to pay your bills, hopefully, and buy unnecessary things for yourself which make you unnecessarily happy. I miss the stomach dropping feeling mixed with the complete happiness of spending too much money on a coat,or not having to worry about filling my car up. The assurance of next months pay made everything okay because, well, there was always next month. 

 Everyone knows the saying, Love makes the world go round. Well that’s brilliant isn’t it? Because I know that love is wonderful, but money is unfortunately a necessity if you want to buy too much make up like me, go out for food an unnecessary amount of times like me, if you crave adventure and sunshine like me; without undermining your intelligence, we know they aren't free. If they were, there would be no such thing as an employer or a employee. I think you’d find me in a dingy boat half way across the ocean, strolling along the canals in Amsterdam without a care in the world. Or maybe in Japan eating sushi, or New York doing, well anything, it would be something cool because I’d be in New York okay. I know my travel rambles are completely off the subject, but the point is money is essential, even to become this non-corporate globe-trotter we’ve all considered being, we still need cash. So, what a sad thought to realise that money actually makes the world go round. God, that sounded so depressing and I’m not trying to be the downer of the story, I’m just trying to put into words how annoying it is to go from a steady income to realising there isn’t a pay slip at the end of the first ‘unemployed month’.  

  I love my family, my friends, my...I hate saying boyfriend, I don’t know why and it’s in no way a reflection of him, he’s a legend and makes me laugh all day but it’s just a bit cringy at times isn’t it? Anyway, back to it, I love them all. But it doesn’t solve my problem, and that’s what is so frustrating, they can’t magic me up a job, and I certainly would not expect them to. When you have so many people who are there for you; and rooting for you at every step, the feeling of letting them down can be all the more difficult. God Mam, why can’t you just not care and not cry when I cry? You are literally so thoughtless *scoff*.  Dad, why can’t you just stop telling me you’re proud of me? Tom, why won’t you just worry with me instead of telling me I have nothing to worry about at all?! Can my friends just stop telling me I did the right thing leaving my job and call me a massive failure instead, would that be so hard?

(I really hope people get all that as sarcasm, otherwise I sound like a massive bitch,in reality I know they’re all completely right and I would be bloody lost without them.)

I don’t think it’s the feeling of not having a job that’s so disheartening for me at the minute. I suppose on paper it’s not so bad getting up whenever you like, wearing lounge wear all day, getting longer than half an hour to make and eat lunch, all plus points I know . All things I probably would have sold a non-essential organ for a month ago, but now they’re wearing thin. I want to have a reason to wash and brush my hair everyday god damn it. I want to be on my to a job where I can see the sun rising from my car, I want to rush eat my pack of sandwiches because I’m so busy, the kind of busy which makes a day fly. I want to wear nice trousers and the kind of blazer which says ‘I can walk the walk’ even if I can’t quite talk the talk. I want to look like a put together young lady; even if I’m not 100% sure of what one of those even is.  I don’t want to wake up at 11, I’m not even hungover so it’s completely unnecessary for my health and well being. I don’t want to wear Nike leggings all day everyday, the white tick logo is fading too, so soon I’ll just be in regular black leggings, which is somehow even more tragic. 

This is what limbo feels like, (my best friend gave me the word limbo to use so I thank her because it’s the perfect word for my current state of life). But I guess I need to understand that I’m not the only person living there. There are so many people residing in the in-between. The same friend who says all the right words has her own limbo of doing a Masters, what a smarty pants limbo to be in though (prouder than punch). But yes, her limbo is currently in between education and the desire to search for job when she leaves education. I guess we always want things we never imagined. I never thought we’d both be yearning for a job, and to pay bills and gain responsibility. I thought they were the things we were running from by being in University, now they’re all we want. I thought I could have stayed in University forever, not because I’m lazy or don’t want to grow up; but because I got to follow my passion,and create my own opinions, and write about things that mattered to me, even if ‘The History of the English Language’ lectures didn’t always feel that way. It sounds self-serving but I miss sharing my ideas with people and someone saying ‘well done’. It certainly beats the ‘It’s not you it’s me’ rejection emails of late. But let’s not talk about them, because it’s important to focus on potential opportunities, not the negativity of rejection. Being 22 can feel old sometimes,  I know that is ridiculous, but it’s the oldest I’ve ever been so have no hindsight to hit me over the head. So hopefully when I’m 30 (which actually doesn’t sound as far away as it used to) I’ll look back and think of how silly I was to worry about this, maybe it’ll all have fallen into place by then. Maybe by then then love will actually make the world go round, and money is a thing of the past, you’ll find me somewhere, eating Sushi, in a blazer, acting like I know what the hell I’m doing. Imagine that. 

Rachael 

[coffeeandcontradictions]

Car Park Meltdowns and Super noodle sandwiches

I went to Aldi to buy one pack of 19 pence Chicken Super noodles today. The end. No but seriously I did. One pack of noodles and a pack of knock off variety chocolate eggs purchased. When you don't have a job chocolate focussed holidays are a key part of enjoyment and the run up is no exception. So, happy with my purchases I ate the eggs in my car and scrolled through jobs in a car park. I don't think there has ever been such a tragic scene since well, since I was wailing crying on the A470 that day I quit my job. Again, all these incidents seem to be occurring in my car. A little boy I used to work with used to call it 'Rachael's coffee car' because of the colour, is it okay to miss something without regretting the end of it? There is a point to this patchy anecdote about my daily shop of two key ingredients by the way. If I had a job I wouldn't be in Aldi at 1:34pm on a Wednesday afternoon buying Easter chocolate and noodles that are not real noodles. Days can seem aimless and unproductive even when you're searching for a job. Because let's be honest, the 'job search', although we might tell ourselves it does, doesn't begin at 8am and end at 5:30pm every single day. There are days when you wake up and think 'actually no I cannot write another cover letter today detailing why I deserve a chance', there are days that the jobless title you attach to yourself does not make you any less human or any less fed up. We're not meant to sit in self pity all our lives or think the odds are stacked against us. But we are allowed a day, an hour, an afternoon of 'I'm actually tamping that no one wants me to work for them' self wallowing. I did that in my car today, yes, in an Aldi car park. Then went home and made a super noodle sandwich, if that 3:30pm meal doesn't scream 'unemployed' I don't know what does. But it's 5:55pm now and I feel a little better, car park meltdowns and all. Rachael

[coffeeandcontradictions]

Didn’t want to recruit anyway..meh

Study the below picture before engaging with another rant by myself. The following ramble will not make much sense otherwise. By the way, the title sounds bitter but it’s most obviously a joke. Because if I’d had an email saying ‘You are the winner, we are taking a chance on you to hire teachers to educate the world, well done you’, then I would have a job, an income, and a slightly less manic/panic approach to life at the minute, okay.

Firstly, I’m good at rejection I think. I’ve thought this since Bristol University sent me a rejection email 12 times over in 2013. That was savage, but I’m still hoping to this day it was a technical glitch and not just a a reflection of how little they wanted me to be an alumni of their English Department. But anyway, all water under the bridge. Back to it, I’m okay with rejection, but tell me why you’re rejecting me. It’s like someone dumping you without a reason, unnecessary and kind of rude. And what’s worse than getting no reason? Three mini reasons, which aren't really reasons, more like automated responses. Similar to the classic ‘It’s not you it’s me’, or ‘We both want different things’ or ‘I think we’re better off as friends’ (with 0 intention of organising any future friendly activities). 

Thank god that the company reassured me that their decision to not employ me was ‘not based on any single aspect’ , brilliant, more than one reason why you don’t like the sound of me. (I even wrote a cover letter, what more could I do?!). Instead their decision was made, overnight, due to my lack of  ‘a combination of relevant experience, company requirements and the pool of other candidates’. 

Okay, so maybe I’ve never recruited before, fair enough. But I’m sure they just asked for outgoing and confident people? I said I was both those things so don’t know how I failed that section, but hey ho, I think they have trust issues. The killer blow was the ‘pool of other candidates’ which just makes it sound like I’m in a metaphorical pool of people who have a class front crawl and can recruit and swim backwards all at once and I’m just the kid drowning in the middle like, ‘someone throw me some armbands or a chance to prove I can make phone calls and right emails quite competently’ As if I’d have chance to say all that if I was drowning.

It’s okay though, I didn’t want to recruit anyway, meh. 

[coffeeandcontradictions]

[coffeeandcontradictions]

I got the job search blues

Had a really full day of cups of tea and the familiar feeling of failure of not being able to find a job. I sat at my kitchen table from 8:30am to 5:00pm scrolling through numerous job sites typing the following;

- NP56 3XF (not my postcode so don’t even) jobs - writing jobs - administration jobs - recruitment consultant - Journalism Intern - jobs which use an English degree - graduate jobs for English graduate -teaching assistant jobs

As the day went on I became increasingly less selective;

- caravan salesman (pays not bad) - Computer sales - fork lift driver (how fast can I obtain a forklift license before interview, Google this later)

After 6 hours of trawling and reading descriptions of jobs which require me to have 58573882 years of experience with Microsoft excel I turn to Google with the hope that it can answer these key questions I now have, after my 3rd bowl of cereal and half a Toblerone.

Search 1 - ‘ways of making money whilst looking for a job’

Search 2- 'Do I actually get any funding to teach the next generation of the world? Yes or no?’ (The answer seems to be No as I don’t possess a degree in Physics or Maths)

Search 3 - 'Can I be a Maths teacher if I’m bad at Maths? Because they got lots of money to learn and I get zilch’

Search 4- 'How to start my own business? because a job search in today’s economic climate is BLEAK’ (okay I just asked the question but still)

Search 5- ’ How to not worry about not having your shit together at 22’

Yes. It was a bad day overall. And it’s better to laugh at it most of the time, but sometimes a good cry will do as well. I don’t like doing the whole 'poor me’ routine, but it is honestly so disheartening to click on jobs which you’re just not qualified for.

Today, all I could think was that I regretted those three years of University (which isn’t reality because I learnt a lot about myself, and books and what literature does for us, and met some of my best friends I could ask for, and had some wicked great fun times), but it’s hard. When you’re staring at Indeed.com and you can’t speak 'proper’ Welsh to work in Admin at Cardiff University, you don’t know how to use Adobe Photoshop shop to get that super cool marketing job that sounds fancier than it’s actually going to be, when you can’t magic three years of PR experience from under your belt because you spent it in University, thinking it’ll all be 'sound’.

To go from seeing my parents looking at me on graduation day, so proud, to sitting at the kitchen table refreshing emails to see if there’s finally light at the end of the graduate tunnel months later, it’s a kick in the tea stained teeth. Thankfully, my parents still tell me how proud there are of me. Even proud of me for quitting a job. Absolutely mental, but thank god for them.

Tomorrow’s a new day though, a new job to not be qualified for, maybe a rejection email, or maybe not. Maybe I’ll be qualified and maybe it’ll be better.

Rachael

[coffeeandcontradictions]

New Lessons..failures, either or.

I left my job. I graduated in July, got a job in July, out of a fear that I’d never find anything. I always had this worry that’d I’d be just another graduate who was as unemployable as the day they started drinking Jager bombs mid-week or changing into pjyamas at 3:30pm because the ‘school day’ had essentially finished. I started my job in September and loved it so so much. Come January, I could hear it, ‘maybe I got this wrong’. ‘Maybe you rushed into this.’ Maybe, maybe, maybe. 

When I left, I drove home in floods of failure tears wondering what the fuck I was going to do now. I knew I’d made the right decision but still had the overwhelming fear of being lost, not actually lost I knew my way home, but you know what I mean. I don’t think I’ve ever experienced the emotion of relief mixed with massive sadness before.  Maybe the last time I got dumped but even then it wasn’t as powerful. The knot in my stomach was gone, as was the overwhelming urge to vomit into my glove box. But it was replaced with a feeling of missing, and a wondering of whether I would be forgotten or replaced by another mouthy fake red-head by the time I’d gone through the gates for the last time. If there is a replacement, regardless of hair-dye and ability to talk about shit for longer than necessary, I hope she stands up too. And I hope they take her more seriously than they did me. I hope she’s listened to, her thoughts appreciated and her opinion valued, not laughed at. You’re not meant to underestimate a ginger, fake or otherwise. 

[coffeeandcontradictions]

Hello, it's me

My name is Rachael Davies. I’m closer to 20 than 30 so feel like my current life status of ‘in a job which fries my brain and don’t really know what this whole adult life shabang is all about’ is perfectly okay, normal and justified. *cough cough, insert silent panic over life goals and wishes.*

What I do know is that I love to write, whether it’s to empty the thoughts from my head onto paper, just to rant onto a blank page rather than my nearest and dearest. Or to document my memories of people due to my newfound fear of forgetting those I love. I know that sounds odd but losing family or drifting from friends makes you realise the importance of memory and the vital nature of retaining information about those we love, instead of the assumption that they’ll always be here, therefore there will never be a day we need to remember. I realise this sounds terribly dramatic but I guess this is just to show how important writing is to me. It’s more than a hobby its a necessity.

I hope you will enjoy my recalling of memories and hopefully my creation of some worthwhile new ones.

Rachael