I wrote a post about a month and a half ago and forgot to click “Publish”. Here it is, exactly as written, and I will follow it up with a few updates.

Hello Blogisphere,

Today is day two at my new job as a line cook for Ranch Pizza at a convention center. Working at a convention center is cool because every day I get access to a new concert or sporting event. Service ends before the games/concerts, so after work, if I like the artist or am interested in the game, I can sneak in and watch for free. 

Getting a second job was a hard decision, as I’m fully aware of how burnt out I still am. I worked myself half to death for many years before I landed in Portland, and by the time I graduated from the CIA and put down roots, I could barely handle 45 hours/week at Hilton. If you follow my blog or my Instagram, you know a fair bit about why Hilton isn’t the type of work I want to be doing. A restaurant where quantity is valued high above quality, convenience matters much more than healthfulness, technique, or flavor, is the stuff of my nightmares. My passion for cooking revolves around sustainability, ethical farming practices, and high quality food. That doesn’t necessarily mean fine dining; there are plenty of more accessible types of cuisine that still meet these standards, but fine dining, or at least farm-to-table dining, is where I’ve been the most passionate about my day-to-day life. 

It’s been 90% of my career. I started working in restaurants almost six years ago. I’ve worked in eight professional kitchens to date, not counting culinary school, and I’ve often held at least two jobs. Of those eight, only three haven’t been farm-to-table. I started within my niche and never really felt the urge to leave it. I ended up at Hilton about 1.5 years ago due to financial desperation, and still haven’t had the opportunity or savings to leave. When I started my job search, I was looking for a fine dining position to replace Hilton, and instead was offered a part time job at a decidedly not fine dining pizza place. Ranch Pizza at the Moda center faces some of the same problems as Hilton; when producing food for that many people, corners inevitably get cut. Marinara sauce is made cold using canned tomatoes and an immersion blender. Ranch is made 22 quarts at a time, and no one has time to do a taste test. That being said, most of the ingredients we use don’t come from Sysco, unlike Hilton. The dough is made fresh by hand, and the pizzas are never frozen. The bar was low, but I was determined to find a job that was better than Hilton, and I have. 

Taking it on as a second job was a challenging decision. I’ve recently gotten back into some hobbies I used to enjoy. I’ve been spending my free time with the people I love, trying to focus on consciously deepening relationships with people that I know are good for me. I started going to therapy and have been making an effort to improve myself one day at a time. I have a lot to work on. I need time to work on it if I ever want to improve. The last time I took on a second job was when I began this blog. If you remember, I started it with the intention of being able to afford some of the bigger ticket items on my list, but found that I had no time for any of the list while working 100 hour weeks. I’m definitely shy of 100 hours with my current set up, but I do believe that anything past 70 hours feels about the same. I don’t miss being exhausted all the time. I don’t miss my body hurting so constantly the way it used to. I’ve grown used to 45 hours/week, and honestly I’m not sure if I can go back to doing more. I’m scared. 

I’ve never really faced this belief that I couldn’t  handle something. Growing up, I was often told how hard the path I was choosing would be. My dad said there were too many people going into the culinary industry for me to make any sort of name for myself. The same goes for my identity; I’ve been told countless times how much harder transitioning would make my life. I’ve always been able to brush it off and keep pushing. At some point in the past two years, I lost that ability. I can’t say with any certainty that I’m capable of more than I’ve been giving. But I have to try. I’m so tired of groveling to my brother for rent money. I’m tired of having to tell myself “no” when I want to do something I enjoy. I’ve been working very hard for a long time, and had been making good money. I got used to a lifestyle that I enjoyed living, one with room in the budget for a cup of coffee on a bad day, or to treat myself to a meal out when I didn’t want to cook. Now I’ve lived once again on the other side, the side I hid from for so long. I remember my parents struggling to make payments, explaining to my brother and I how it was either groceries or rent, and I spent so long running from that life. I told myself I’d never find myself back there, and now I have. It sucks. I want more for myself. So, I have to try, no matter how tired I am. I have to believe I can do it. I have to look in the mirror each morning and say “you can do this” until it sounds less impossible. Even if I can only manage three months, I keep telling myself, that’s progress. Progress is all I can ask for. So for now (not forever, mind you), I will try anyway, despite my brain and body telling me to give up.

Sometimes I’m fraught with the knowledge of how easy it would be to work at Hilton for the rest of my life. Many of my coworkers have been there 20+ years. There is no way I’d survive it, but I could manage it for a while. The easy way out is never satisfying, though, and I know that despite the burnout, I’m capable of more. After doing Sober September with some friends, I have realized how much I hate feeling hungover all the time. I hate being in a constant state of recovery. I’ve realized that the party needs to stop, and that, for lack of a better term, it’s time for me to once again “lock in”. I need more. I need to do more. I need to be more, otherwise, all the work I’ve done already was for naught. And that’s a reality I can’t accept, won’t accept. So we try. We push on. We do the best we can with what we have, and maybe we fray the rope a little bit, knowing it’s better to be slightly frayed than drunk and miserable all the time. I hope this comes off as somewhat motivational rather than a cry for help. I’m officially asking myself for progress once again. Let’s see what happens.

Now for the updates:

I’ve been working both jobs for almost two months now. It’s hard, but we’re almost to December. In December, I’ll be eligible to lower my monthly payment for my student loans by some undisclosed amount. Hopefully, this will negate the necessity for a second job, although it doesn’t mean I will quit right away. I will continue to push my way through the work for as long as I can, and I’m beginning to accept that come July, I will need to find a roommate or three. I’ve really enjoyed living on my own and having the freedom that comes with it, but even temporarily, the money I’d be able to save if my living situation were cheaper is worth the lifestyle change it would require of me. I’ve been thinking more and more about moving back to California, and how I would need to have a car before I even consider attempting to move. This means that I need to save enough for a car, a monthly car payment, and car insurance. On top of that, I would need to have several months of student loan payments saved so that I’d be alright while I looked for a job. Suffice to say, it will unquestionably be a while before I move back to California. I knew this already, but it’s nice to think about the finer details and consider it more thoroughly. It remains my end goal, though. I wonder sometimes if the goal of moving back to Cali is preventing me from fully enjoying my life here in Portland. But I would also argue that it motivates me, and the knowledge that this isn’t what I’ll spend the rest of my life doing is helpful when the days start to feel a little too repetitive.

In other news, I’m still waiting on illustrations for my book, Growing Feathers, but the manuscript remains there and ready to publish. I’m about twenty pages into the sequel, Sprouting Wings, and I think it’s some of the best work I’ve done. I’m excited to publish, but more than anything, I’m excited to move on from that chapter of my life. The poems in Growing Feathers are almost all relatively new and almost entirely about the same experience/people. I’m ready to move on, and I’m excited to be able to literally, physically close that chapter of my life and move on to the next. I’m proud of the work I’ve done in the sequel, especially because it means diving into some issues I typically try not to think about (hello, mother). I’m proud of what I’ve written, and I’m excited to have it out there in the world. For now, though, it remains a waiting game, one I am not patiently playing.

I haven’t written much on here about the situation from the past few months. I find it incredibly hard to write about, and honestly I feel it may be better to keep it under wraps. I will say it was the hardest thing I’ve ever experienced, and I’m incredibly proud of myself for how well I’ve bounced back. It’s been a very rough few months, and I’m looking forward to the next few being relatively free of drama.