I finally hit 30.

I used to close my eyes and wish for time to accelerate, for the years to rush past just below my perception so that when I opened them again I would see myself somewhere else, with someone else, doing anything else.

I've never had a job, not a real one anyway. I've always worked though, even as a kid. Every weekend since I can remember I have been working a stand at a flea market. My family sells clothes at four different flea markets six days a week. As a kid I helped with what I could. Eventually I helped with everything. After I graduated, weekends became six out of seven days of every week. Now we all work ourselves ragged every day. I am a tired, mindless body.

We make ends meet by living within our means. I don't have a car. I don't have an income. Sometimes I'll hide a hundred dollars before handing in any sales to my dad. So maybe that makes my income a hundred dollars every two or three weeks. I mostly use that to buy vapes, cat food, and cat litter. Sometimes I'll use what's left for mutual aid or save up to do so later.

I suspect I am somewhere on the autism spectrum and/or suffer from ADHD. I've been depressed for almost half my life now. I suspect I'm only still around because I am a coward. It's gotten too close to escape its pull but I won't so I am trapped. Zoloft and therapy helped for a little while but I quit after they didn't. To top it off, this was all before my egg cracked but my home situation is not one in which I can present how I would prefer even now.

I went to college on the government's dime for a bachelor's in computer science. I looked at my degree once and haven't seen it since. Fragments of websites, webapps, api wrappers, an ecommerce store, blog posts, essays, and shit litter my memory, failures that weigh my conscience with shame. At this point I'm not entirely sure if I was ever actually able to write any code or if just I bullshit my way through everything in life to protect my fragile ego.

But I need to get better. My life will not change unless I make it change. I need to get a job, I need to be self-sufficient, I need to grow.

The largest hurdle I can see is my complete lack of experience. I graduated almost a decade ago. I'll be starting from the bottom way later than I should have. Looking at local job openings on Indeed, it seems my best bet will be some sort of IT or Help Desk role. I'm taking a break from reading theory to read about networking and cybersecurity. I remember much of the network material while the cybersecurity concepts at least make sense to me.

The next step of the plan is already daunting to me. I need to write a resume. How to do this thing with no experience? An eternal problem I'll need to figure out. This is as far as I've gotten but I'm not giving up. It's about time I grow up.

Thanks for reading. Apologies for whining about a job.

  • D61 [any]
    ·
    8 months ago

    I need to write a resume. How to do this thing with no experience?

    Shit I wish somebody had drilled into my head when I was in middle/highschool. Maintain a journal that is just a record of things you've done for work, or done to make money, or just things you've done. Then use those items as headings and then you'll fill out specific tasks related to the headings.

    So you said you worked a booth at a flea market. Okay...

    Fanny's Flea Market, Booth Worker (part time) ---Jan 1992 ~ May 1997 (relevant point of contact, if available) Fanny's Flea Market, Booth Worker (full time) ---May 1997 ~ December 1999 (relevant point of contact, if available)

    What did you sell there? How did you get the stuff that was sold? ~Things I did when working at Fanny's Flea Market~~

    Received donated items for resale Sorted sellable from un-sellable items Cleaned items for resale Priced, stocked and organized displays in retail areas Removed damaged items from sales areas Mopped/swept/dusted/etc sales areas Completed customer transactions, making change, accepting checks, handling card transactions Balanced till Prepared deposit for (daily, weekly, monthly sales) Answered customer questions about products and the booth's policies. Worked with minimal supervision (I"m sure you family pretty much trusted you to do things on your own pretty fast)

    So, from there, you'd look at a job posting and when filling out your work history pick a few of the ~Things I did when working at...~~ to add under the headings of each item in your work/education history.

    If you have a recent academic history and the job posting is specifically asking for academic stuff, put that at the top of the resume. If your academic stuff is pretty old, put it at the end of your resume.

    Dont forget to look in places with limited distribution for jobs (physical papers that have "Help Wanted" adds). My current job with the local post off was from me seeing a "Help Wanted" add taped on the front door of the post office. Talking to my current boss during an interview, they said that the job had been available and unfilled for about 6 months due to nobody applying but got 10 applications in 2 weeks when they put a fucking sign in the window. (USPS has its own internal job posting website that you aren't allowed to see jobs until you make an go through the hoops to create an account and make a profile. Outside of mail drivers, it seems like all the other Job Posting websites don't see most of the USPS job openings)

    Totally anecdotal, every job I submitted applications to but DIDN'T check the boxes for being available at all times/hours at a moment's notice, I got no response from. The only job that I said I could be available all days/all hours was the post office job so I don't know how much was a fluke or not.