I’m at place of freedom.
I’m in the green room.
The ready, set, go you can be free room.
A place with many doors,
The space where the world is yours,
But Green, Amber, Red, Stop.
There’s a lock.
The key is the key to set you free,
But the lock is the key, you see?
It’s a long line of applications
It’s a mountain of emails saying sorry
It’s a long distance thing
It’s a “You don’t live close enough” thing
It’s a “we’re eco-friendly but you have to have a car to have this job” thing
It’s a “sorry you don’t have enough experience” thing
It’s a time of rejection
It’s a time of no money
It’s a time of hardship
It’s a time when you move back in with your parents
It’s a time of loneliness and confusion
It’s a time of existentialism
It’s a time of questions
It’s a time where you question the time you have spent
It’s a time where you question what you are going to do with your time
It’s jealously
It’s remorse
It’s self-doubt
It’s regret
It’s when you try to keep busy
It’s when people ask you “what are you going to do now?”
It’s when people say, “welcome to the real world”
It’s a “Is that really what I want to do?”
It’s a “Is that what I want?”
It’s a “What on earth do I do now?” thing.
A chapter has ended and I am left stranded.
I’ve spent a while following a regime, a scheme, an education plan and now I’m here.
I am sat in my room that I grew up in.
I am on my bed thinking about what film I should watch,
trying to find a distraction from this ‘real world’ that is happening around me.
This is my first real day as a graduate and I’ve spent it sleeping, eating pizza and investing myself in a fantasy world of television.
I’m sat here and I honestly don’t have a clue what to do with the time I spent at University.
I’ve spent the last months looking and applying for countless jobs that link to my hobbies and the subject I studied at University, and so far I’ve come up empty.
The long reel of emails of not fitting the bill is, at times, overwhelming.
It’s competitive, I know.
I have a BA (Hons) and Odeon wouldn’t give me a job.
But I’ve been keeping busy.
Since finishing University in May:
I continued working as a Student Ambassador for the University until July.
I have worked as a steward for a symposium.
I was a compere at a folk festival.
I worked for a producing company in Edinburgh as a Flyer Distributor.
I was a sound technician for a solo performer during the run of the fringe.
I worked on Box Office for Forest Fringe.
I was the Head Steward of a Folk Festival.
I participated in a DIY15 workshop.
I became a regular volunteer for an arts café.
I graduated.
And this weekend I am a volunteer at Spill Festival.
Looking back on it here on the screen, it doesn’t look like much.
But that’s just the ‘work’ related things I’ve done since May, a lot of them were voluntary.
Now I’ve come to a wall; a roadblock; a blockage of sorts.
Again I find myself asking the question of “What is it really that I want to do?”
Because the more I find myself thinking about things,
the more I seem to not want to do the things I thought I might want to do.
The realms of the ‘real world’ are telling me to get a job, any job, just get a job,
because the world cannot survive without me feeding its economy, of course.
However, in my stubbornness (as some have called it)
I haven’t applied to any jobs that I am not willing to do.
I see this as a complete waste of everyone’s time.
It’s not right to apply for a job, get interviewed for a job or accept a job I do not want to do
especially when there are others out there who would like the job.
I know practice makes perfect and all that jazz
but I’m not interested in working for someone who I don’t care about.
It’s very hard not to just apply for a job I do not want because the ‘real world’ is pushing me really hard.
I’m not sure I will ever know what I want.
I know that I’d like to learn, to be inspired, to inspire, to be creative, to smile, to help,
to assist, to be a part of something that I believe in, to work hard and to be useful,
which is pretty much the basics of what everyone else wants.
Maybe that’s why it’s so difficult.
I don’t know what I am meant to want or what I am meant to do,
only that I am meant to want money, happiness and success.
I’m not sure how to get there.
So far the things that have made me happy are the things that do not pay,
and that doesn’t make me very successful in the ‘real world’.