12:43 AM: Say it ain't

Do you ever fixate?

What am I saying, of course you do. Everyone does, for starters, but more than that, you're very likely me. I think this blog has taken on a very interesting character since I've nakedly embraced the idea that, while it is publicly accessible (a baffling status in 2023) its only regular reader, hopefully only reader overall, is my own future self, looking to reset his brain, weeks or months or years after the fact. Journaling on pen and paper, where it gets shut between covers buried and forgotten, just doesn't do it for me, you know? Doesn't feel real.

So fixation. Yeah, who doesn't get seized by thoughts they just can't shake from time to time, right? It's after midnight and I was lying up in bed, listening to rain sounds and trying to lull myself to sleep by counting X-Men or Aerosmith songs, and I had thoughts that would not go away. Toxic, keep-you-up-at-night thoughts. So now I'm down here typing, my desk light on, listening to R.E.M.'s Up album, my #1 late night album (I did think about listening to XX by the xx though,) ready to spill. And then when my spleen is empty for the night, perhaps I can calm my nerves and rest.

I'm not going to tell you what it is though, I feel like that would give it too much weight and power. I'll have to talk around it. There might be a lot anyway, but scant on details.

I had a conversation earlier this week with a higher-up at the company that sort of changed my thinking about where I'm going. Or should I say, put a bow on things I had already been thinking. It turned some slight negative thoughts I was having into much more severe ones, which in its way is somewhat freeing, because I went from feeling conflicted about something to being quite sure about it, and sureness is a good thing to have, something I don't often have.

Basically, the work I do is not really noticed or appreciated -- not by the people who need to be impressed by me to help me get where I thought I wanted to go. I can be charming, I can present well, I can provide my strong point of view and clear ideas about what I would do in certain situations, but there seems to be this air of "Yeah, but what have you done?" that I can't dispel. Which is bogus for a variety of reasons. I'm at the end of a very storied year in my job. I began it by providing a thoroughly researched and well-analyzed deck of data to the marketing department to use in boosting our profile. In the summer I worked without a direct buying partner for an extended period of time and even took on reporting duties that they would have done, stepping well outside my stated role. I managed relationships with external vendors, in some cases being the loudest voice for my company's needs from our partnership. In November I managed inventory, very successfully, for one of the largest books we'd ever bought, and this very week I'm managing the inventory for the largest book we've ever bought, again very successfully. And it's no secret. 

And the takeaway? "Oh, we just don't know what to think about you."

Motherfucker.

I've cycled through all sorts of different emotions about this. Hurt, indignant, outraged, attempting to understand. Honestly, when I heard this, I guess I just got to a breaking point where I figured there's no point in holding back, so I vomited all my thoughts about that: that first of all, that has nothing to do with whether I'm a good candidate for a job, and secondly, it's not true, and if it is, it's not my problem. I have done everything, I would say 110%-125% of my job for much of the year, in a lot of different capacities, and not secretly, but it has fallen out of the brains of the people who need to see it and in many cases were in the room. That's not my problem, that's a management problem, a culture problem that I happen to be the victim of. It's not my responsibility to grab the rope and right the ship, I am trying to do my job and excel, and if you see it or don't, it doesn't matter, because you should hear me in the interview and draw your conclusions from that.

It's been five years. If you don't know me by now, you will never, ever, ever know me.

The gall, you know? The brass testes to say such a thing, and then double down: "Why are we having this problem? There's something around that." There is, but you're missing it.

It's not about missing out on a job. If you tell me there is someone whose answers you liked better -- and they did -- I will believe you and respect that. Mind you, the last time they said that it ended up being someone who I was still telling how to do his job -- yes, in fact, the job I was declined for -- six months later. Darn nice guy, but needs help.

The moral of this story is that this company has nothing more for me. I wish it weren't so, and I spent five years trying to get myself ready for the opportunities, but it appears it's simply out of reach for ole Scotto. Because I have done it. I have done the things, I have done all that they can reasonably ask of me and shined in all the corners I can, and it's come to this. Not just "Not yet," not just "Not this time," but "Not until we get more."

Fuck it, fuck this company. At one point the other party was saying -- as diplomatically as he could, "You know, if you think you deserve more just for being above average--" "No," I cut him off, "Not 'above average.' Top of the class." (Woah, even I'm surprised to meet this Scotto.) This is not about what I'm entitled to materially (although I am grossly under-compensated) it's about recognition, its value, and its presence. You want me to great, I'm great. You want to see the greatness, you have to look. 

And if they won't look... well, horses and water.

They have nothing to offer me, they have made it clear. They have no space for me, only a bland, insufficient paycheck. I will continue to do my job to the best of my ability, even at that 110% rate that I offer, while I look for a better, more fulfilling direction in which to take my talents. I have never felt so motivated as I do this week, and my only problem is that my brain can't be satisfied with this determination. I have to keep imagining conversations and gotchas and all the gaga. The revenge fantasies. Oh, you know them all to well, don't you?

So many of the best and worst decisions you've made in your life boiled down to three words: "I'll show them."

I don't know if I have greatness in me, but I know I have more than what I am doing today, and I thought that this company might be a nice place to deploy it. They've been good to me and I liked the work, believe in it all. But this is the kind of feedback that really opens your eyes.

I have a lot of anger and frustration. You know, hearing something like that really hits a sore spot. That invisibility, that "you don't matter" ness, that "you're nothing to anybody" insecurity that has plagued me since I was in the sixth fucking grade. Funny that, since I just happen to be writing my memoir project (oh god, that sounds so pukey when I say it.)

Oy, yoy, yoy. This is dangerous.

The weird thing is, although it was definitely emotionally charged, it was relatively diplomatic, and I definitely course-corrected myself back to proper behavior once or twice after flying off the handle. Although he resisted much of what I was saying, he seemed unable to completely deflect. When he asked, "Well, when I had this problem, why did I go to [director] and not you?" Well, why did you? It's not as though I'm not in your inbox several times per day with an e-mail that ends, "If you have any problems, feel free to reach out." This is where we're at. You can take control of something and own it, and they will still have no idea who you are or what you are doing in their e-mails. Oof, getting mad again. For half a sec, he seemed to recognize, I saw in his eyes, it was not a Scott problem. He seemed amenable to the idea of follow-up conversations (when heads, presumably, have cooled, but who knows how long that will take me? Ah, but I'm my father's son.) 

Anyway. It's freeing. That's the final stage of this cycle of emotion, after hurt and anger and frustration and revenge (can revenge be an emotion?) Feeling free. Earth below us, drifting falling, floating weightless, coming home. Financially, I don't know that I can give up the job, but if I stop killing myself trying to care about my future there, I can retake the mental real estate to build the future I want, which is a nice thought, a piece of the puzzle that was missing. Do your worst, you can't kill me, I'm already dead.

Well, this was a hell of an adventure. Once I sensed it was ramping up whether I wanted to or not, I decided I would just go for it and leave this one in the drafts. I'll unseal the records someday, years from now, when we're far enough away from it all. It kind of feels good to put into words, that was what I needed. I mean, I might still fixate when I get back up to work, that remains to be seen, but hopefully I feel better having screamed, don't you?

Keep on rockin'

Mad man Scotto

(Future Scotto says: I have un-sealed the records on April 15 2023. Not for any significant reason, I just feel like we're far enough past it that I no longer need to obscure this. It happened, nothing major has come from it........ yet.)