When 2020 started, I was feeling like my job was pretty stable. Even though my box office job didn’t pay me enough to have it as my only job, it was a steady income that I could count on. And I did have my data entry job to help add to my income. I wanted to do some job hunting this year to find something better, but I also knew how lucky I was to have a job.
Then the pandemic hit and at first, my box office job wasn’t affected. Then it started to change. At first, I was working reduced hours but it was still bringing in decent money. Then it became 3 hours a week and almost no income. And then in August, I was officially let go from that job. My main income (and the job that felt most stable) was done for now. And there is no timeline for when my job will be back because it’s based on the pandemic ending. I had hoped earlier this year that things would be back by now. I still want to hope that they will be back by the spring, but I have also learned that things are so unpredictable.
And my data entry job has been a bit weird since the pandemic as well. Because so much of my work is based on adding events to a calendar, there was a sharp decrease in work for me. Some other factors changed my hours too, but they were things that were a bit more in my control and I was ok with the changes. I’m grateful that at least I had this job plus my unemployment this year. I don’t know what I would have done without it. But I also knew that I couldn’t just sit around and hope for the best.
And that’s one of the reasons I’m so grateful that I got my new job. While I won’t be working my full hours until January and I actually have the next week off, it’s been great! I’m feeling more and more comfortable with the work and what I need to do. And it will almost make up the income that I lost when I lost my box office job.
Plus, I’m really having a great time with this new job. Some of the work is stuff that I can apply in other parts of my life, which is fun! And it’s been awesome getting to know my new co-workers. It’s been all virtual stuff, but that’s ok. There was a work Zoom holiday party and it was nice getting to have time to meet everyone and get to know more about everyone outside of more professional and official stuff. And the best thing is that I feel appreciated. That’s not something you always have at every job. I feel so lucky that they appreciate my work and understand that I am a part of the team. I felt even more appreciated when earlier this week a gift basket arrived with a holiday present from the company!
I was not expecting a gift considering that I haven’t been there for an entire month yet. But it made me smile so much!
And the positive things continued when I had a meeting with my bosses from my data entry job. Technically, my contract ends on the 31st, but there will be a new contract that starts on the 1st. Things still have to be figured out and finalized, but it will be done and that’s a big relief. And in my meeting, I was able to be very honest about how I have been feeling about the job. Lately, I have felt like I was not doing my job because there aren’t things I can add to the website. I feel like I am almost wasting money. It was good to hear from my bosses that they don’t think that about me, but it also opened up the conversation to figure out the best way I can work on the new contract. I think there will be new jobs for me to do that are much more specific goals so I can have things to work toward and have a better way to do time management.
Hopefully, between my new job and the new way I will do my data entry job, things will be much better for me in 2021. And when my box office job comes back, I do hope that they offer me my job again. I don’t know how I would balance everything, but I would at least like the chance to try. But I’m in a much better place now to wait for that job to open than I was before. If it doesn’t come back until almost the end of next year, I will be ok. And I can look into managing all the jobs then. For now, I’m just focused on the jobs I have now.
This year has been such an up and down year for my jobs. It started in a pretty ok place, got bad, and it seems like things are going to end better than the year started. Even though I wanted to find a new job, I’ve had that goal for a while and never accomplished it. And I thought if I found a new job, it was going to be something that wasn’t interesting or that made me happy. This year has been full of so many surprises, and most of them have been bad surprises. So to have a good surprise to end the year is so nice!
