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Challenge #15
Talk about an unexpected joyous moment you experienced last year.
Post your answer to today’s challenge in your own space and leave a comment in this post saying you did it. Include a link to your post if you feel comfortable doing so.
TW: violence, hostile work environment
My unexpected joyous moment of 2024 had nothing to do with fandom. Nothing. Nada. Zip.
I got a new job.
To understand why this is unexpected, we must travel back in time to the night before the job interview. I was at work, which, as it was a Friday night, was entirely routine. I was going to finish at 11pm and my interview was at 7am because when you interview for a job overseas, time zones are a bitch. I was worried about getting up early the next day and trying to focus on running the shop when - as things do - shit hit the absolute fan.
A man was stabbed outside of my shop.
He was a homeless guy, and he was stabbed in the arm, so not anywhere immediately fatal, but it easily could have been. There was blood. Everywhere. I didn't see the stabbing, but I was very, very involved in the aftermath because even though I'm not a trained first-aider and even though plenty of by-standers had their phones out recording, I was the one who phoned the ambulance. I was the one who held this man's arm together and delievered first aid and kept him talking and awake until the ambulance got there.
I was then the one who dealt with the police.
There was blood on my shoes.
I had to keep the shop open. Upper management decided that was the priority, since the crime scene was the bus station rather than the shop itself, and the fact that there was a man's blood soaking into my socks didn't matter.
Apparently.
His name is Simon and he's two weeks younger than my older brother and it's entirely possible that I saved his life that night.
So that interview the next morning? I woke up on time for it. I got through it in a haze of what the actual fuck was that and then headed back into work because retail doesn't care if you have trauma. (The following day I had a Chinese exam and another job interview, and I honestly don't remember a lot of that weekend as a whole except the way blood feels as it seeps into your clothes and how Simon was holding my hand as he started drifting in and out of consciousness.)
Days passed. Then a week. Then I gave up. Clearly, the interviewer had seen some of my residual wide-eyed terror and decided that this job (that I was too inexperienced for, anyway) was not for me. I'd have to keep looking and boy, was I looking. The degree to which I wanted out of my old job by this point had passed astronomical and was heading towards something incalcuable.
Then I got an email.
I don't remember much about that, either, except that I was screaming out-loud instead of just internally because I had a new job and I also had six weeks in which to move to Vietnam. The job I'd applied for despite not having enough experiece for, and then interviewed for the morning after one of the worst experiences of my life, and then given up on entirely - it was mine.
It is mine.
And I love it.
Talk about an unexpected joyous moment you experienced last year.
Post your answer to today’s challenge in your own space and leave a comment in this post saying you did it. Include a link to your post if you feel comfortable doing so.
TW: violence, hostile work environment
My unexpected joyous moment of 2024 had nothing to do with fandom. Nothing. Nada. Zip.
I got a new job.
To understand why this is unexpected, we must travel back in time to the night before the job interview. I was at work, which, as it was a Friday night, was entirely routine. I was going to finish at 11pm and my interview was at 7am because when you interview for a job overseas, time zones are a bitch. I was worried about getting up early the next day and trying to focus on running the shop when - as things do - shit hit the absolute fan.
A man was stabbed outside of my shop.
He was a homeless guy, and he was stabbed in the arm, so not anywhere immediately fatal, but it easily could have been. There was blood. Everywhere. I didn't see the stabbing, but I was very, very involved in the aftermath because even though I'm not a trained first-aider and even though plenty of by-standers had their phones out recording, I was the one who phoned the ambulance. I was the one who held this man's arm together and delievered first aid and kept him talking and awake until the ambulance got there.
I was then the one who dealt with the police.
There was blood on my shoes.
I had to keep the shop open. Upper management decided that was the priority, since the crime scene was the bus station rather than the shop itself, and the fact that there was a man's blood soaking into my socks didn't matter.
Apparently.
His name is Simon and he's two weeks younger than my older brother and it's entirely possible that I saved his life that night.
So that interview the next morning? I woke up on time for it. I got through it in a haze of what the actual fuck was that and then headed back into work because retail doesn't care if you have trauma. (The following day I had a Chinese exam and another job interview, and I honestly don't remember a lot of that weekend as a whole except the way blood feels as it seeps into your clothes and how Simon was holding my hand as he started drifting in and out of consciousness.)
Days passed. Then a week. Then I gave up. Clearly, the interviewer had seen some of my residual wide-eyed terror and decided that this job (that I was too inexperienced for, anyway) was not for me. I'd have to keep looking and boy, was I looking. The degree to which I wanted out of my old job by this point had passed astronomical and was heading towards something incalcuable.
Then I got an email.
I don't remember much about that, either, except that I was screaming out-loud instead of just internally because I had a new job and I also had six weeks in which to move to Vietnam. The job I'd applied for despite not having enough experiece for, and then interviewed for the morning after one of the worst experiences of my life, and then given up on entirely - it was mine.
It is mine.
And I love it.
no subject
Date: 2025-01-31 11:27 am (UTC)From:Oh my, that's a rough journey, but I'm glad you came out on the other side with a new job you love.
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Date: 2025-01-31 12:00 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2025-01-31 01:23 pm (UTC)From:no subject
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