Brrrrrrrown.

A year and a half ago, coinciding with the Taste of Minnesota for an easily datable period, I hit a wall, hard. My usual energy reserves from which I had drawn a remarkable wellspring of activity and workplace production was imperiled, and no amount of energy drinks was capable of reviving it. I became moodier, more sullen, prone to sarcasm and fatigue during long sessions in meetings, leading to meetings with management that became weekly events, resulting in written disciplinary action, followed last week by my dismissal from Brown College admissions, a job I had held for three years.

The mixture of relief that has only deepened since isn't anything I can begin to articulate. I spent the first four days sleeping fifteen hours a day, getting up only to evacuate, check my emails, and walk a few blocks to the corner store for only necessary supplies. I knew I was burned-out, but I didn't realize how badly scorched I was until I was finally given an out. True to form, I was given a comically undersized cardboard box to hold my possessions, and was escorted out to my car, my departure kept secret from coworkers, some of whom graciously flooded my email and phone with genuine concern.

Two psychiatrists have, quite unprovoked, referred to my job as a 'sweatshop,' and the last one advised me to take more of a 'if they fire me, so what?' attitude towards work, since it was clearly taking too much out of me. I wondered for a long time if the problem was with me. What if I was, as management thought, lazy and uncaring? Why was I beginning to dread talking to people on the phones, and why was I suddenly being targeted by the corporate hyenas as being a bane to the herds? I felt really badly about myself for at least six months, buying into their bullshit, until I turned the problem around by realizing how amazingly fucked-up a place to work it was.

Motivation through humiliation, embarrassment, and pitting us against each other to eek out another enrollment became unbearable. I started taking anti-anxiety pills like candy at my desk. We weren't allowed to go out to lunch together, and the few times we would be in each others' offices, a manager would chastise us for not being on the phones. Over three years, I became a glorified telemarketer with a snappier title. My manager refused to write a letter or recommendation for my graduate school application because she thought I was a 'space-case,' and had a 'helium head,' and my performance that month wasn't worthy. Then, she blocked my tuition reimbursement application on the same grounds.

Never has a job been more inconsistent. I was either the hero, or the office idiot, meaning my emotions were being manipulated constantly. I awakened thinking about it, and I went to bed thinking about it. When I would take a sick day, my manager would call me to ask what kind of illness I had. It was slave labor, confined to our offices, and being told that 'we're giving students too much choice, and to not ask them if they want to enroll, but tell them.' I got abused for everything, and you can only run the engine that hard for that long, before it gets hot and seizes.

The notable thing is that I was coming off my finest and most productive student start for the year, and I was being commended by others as being more focused and attentive. Three months ago, I applied to a job in financial aid, which I though surely would give me another, fresh challenge, while getting me off the front-lines, and away from some stresses. Under dubious terms, I was blocked from applying, as anybody on a performance improvement plan was prohibited from internal restructuring. I was on a verbal warning, not a written, and was within rights to have my application considered. After taking it on the chin for so long, I didn't fight it, and became even more resigned to making my hundred phone calls per day, setting three appointments, and having to hit numbers that were statistical impossibilities.

I had been talking wistfully for years about getting laid-off, and collecting unemployment, which will cover all my bills, with extra to spare. I'm immensely grateful to not have to participate in the con-game and mental jujitsu on a daily basis, and now have time to focus on graduate school that starts in early January. My time off has only made me realize how insanely goofy the entire for-profit education system is, and while I'm grateful to have had the experiences, wouldn't wish that kind of job on anybody. I'll say thanks, and a hearty fuck-you to those deserved, and move on, knowing that I always did my best for my students, and was never unfair or didn't have their best interests as my first priority. Those students who have bestowed upon me their gratitude for my hard work will always be in my thoughts. It was for them that I got up everyday, not for a bunch of overpaid corporate misanthropes in a Chicago office, that eventually sent me into therapy, counseling, and in pursuit of medications to cope.

The problem was never with me, it was with them. If they can somehow look themselves in the mirror everyday without frowning, they're not worth my, or anyone's time. Onward, and evermore, upward.