I am not a young professional.

I got a job because I had too much free time.

I want a job because it's nice to get paid.

I will only work for people I can respect.

I will only work for people who respect me.

I will not let any corporation exploit my skills. They're mine.

My job does not define who I am.

I am above and beyond titles.

What ladder?

I am not a young professional!

The Tao of Me (Corporate Edition)

Tic-toc, tic-toc, tic-toc. A different office, a different cubicle, a different desk, and certainly a different dress code, and yet I could have sworn that I haven’t moved a muscle in the past 3 years of my fledgling career. If you’re wondering, this would be employment #3.

Some people ask: How the hell do you expect to advance in your career if you don’t know how to stick it out? Oh the horrors of starting again and again at entry level. Stick with what you know, with what you have, where you are and sometime, somehow, and if you’re patient enough, you’d get your due.

That’s fine and dandy. If I had a candy for everytime someone gave me the you-have-so-much-potential-if-only-you-had-the-ambition-to-match-it speech, I’d probably have no teeth by now.

Unfortunately, the dazzle of corporate success doesn't bring out the desire in me. Money is a good thing to have, yes, but this generation's obsession on becoming the corporate rotweiler that's ready to snag the next big corporate bone one after another...well, that's a fever I did not catch. There’s the corporate ladder and everyone’s foaming in the mouth and stumbling over themselves to go climb it. There I am standing a few feet away from the crowded base. There I am. And I. Am. Not. Getting. It. And so I go tra-la-la-ing away to see if there's something else to do. Society has a term for people like me: Irresponsible Imbecile.

I’m sorry. I don’t do that kind of climbing. I'm more of a strolling-up-the-slope kind of person.

Hey, I did have an ambition once upon a time when I was an idealistic little dork. Then I learned to ask “Why? Why should I?”

Because I want to?

Says who? Folks, you think you want to because all your life everyone says you have to.

So until that day that I find a job I know for certain I want or at the very least can compromise with, I will not settle. I'm not one to fear the idea of starting over...Excuse me for trying to resist some ambiguous-know-it-all-theorist’s preconceived plan about how life is supposed to be lived.

Lemme see:

Now I’m born. Check.
Now I’m educated. Check.
Now I work. Check.

Next we wed.
Next we breed.
Next we die.

There’s your happily ever after.

Wow. I can’t wait.



Hamburgers.

Huff and Puff...and then Puff some more!

A year ago, I came to a conclusion that the reason why I’ve stayed far away from pen, paper, and keyboard, was because there was not a god damn thing worth writing about. Add on another couple of months and I’m starting to get twitchy. When I’ve been able to rag on about the littlest things before, surely with some major occurrences in my life, I should be scratching the skin off my palms and itching to bitch about it. Shouldn’t I? I should! And that’s why I’m thinking about getting worried.

5 years ago, I was in a hell of pain. It was the German measles. I had mouth sores on every available space of soft tissue inside my mouth, and finding it already cramped in there, the little suckers decided “What the hell, the throat’s not exactly prime location, but I gotta lay claim on this sick baby.” I couldn’t speak, I couldn’t hum, I couldn’t wet my flaking bloated lips, I couldn’t drink water, and eating became the equivalent of a hundred little explosions inside my mouth.

But most of all, I couldn’t express myself other than a small buzzer that was constantly battered by my rashed itchy finger everytime I needed nursing. And believe me, if you were in my house at that time, you would have forgotten I was sick and just raged inside the room to ram that annoying buzzer down my throat --- but after seeing my painful oral state, I bet you would reconsider and instead just drive it up my ass.

I couldn’t swear, I couldn’t throw a tantrum, heck, I couldn’t even cry but can only manage an “uuuunnnggggg”. That little groan there should include an “hhhhh” in the end, but I couldn’t afford that. That would mean blowing air and causing a riot with the mouth sores. Frustration and pain forcibly shoved down my bowels when I would rather bellow it to the gods that I, Jenifer, have a lot of complaining to do about this nasty little business. I thought it the most excruciating pain I’ve ever felt in my life. And if Homer Simpson were there to hear me, he’d tenderly ruffle my hair and say “The most excruciating pain SO FAR!”

So far indeed.

Five years later and here I am yet again stifled. You’ve heard of verbal diarrhea. I have mental constipation. It’s all there. It’s jammed inside. I just can’t get it out. This would account to the months and months of static silence especially in writing my little monologues. Lately, I cower when given a pen. I’m sorry, sign my signature where? Oh no!

Cigarettes, they say, have a laxative effect and I can give you full names of people who suck on a stick while going about the oddly-pleasant-yet-still-obliged-as-eeky process of shitting. But surely I’ll be crossing an ethical line and we’re not running an exposé here. Seeing as I am literally shit-constipated too, I am addicted to what I like to call an enema rolled into a 3½ inch stick. NO, I’m not talking about a penis. Or a small penis. *snorts in disgust* Alright, so I’m bad at metaphors right now, screw you!

I can’t really attest to the laxative powers of smoking other than sometimes it gives me a bad case of gas, but when taken while walking around the city during semi-cold nights and ears plugged with music from my iPod (wow, how commercialized am I now eh?), the so-called mental constipation sees a glimmer of release. Headlights, streetlights, smog, nicotine, and strangers in the night makes for a good fix to get that clear reception of free-flowing thoughts back. Plus it helps if I start walking against the flow of the crowd. The voice in my head, my eternal narrator comes within hearing and I can totally see her smirking and barking out observations and ridicules.

Problem solved? Sure, if I can learn how to scribble fast while walking.

Again, the question. Should I be worried? No. Not really. I’m just building shit. Material, some would say. And besides, you can’t just pull these things out of your ass now can you? I’m gonna go, when I gotta go!

I’ll take another puff for now. J