Recently I was hired for a writing job. The hiring process went a bit like this……..
Evil: “Hey, you’re a writer, will you freelance a report for our company?”
Rebecca: “Oh, I don’t know, I write and all, but I really don’t think I’m that sort of writer.”
Evil: ” We’ll pay you XY plus Z for 50 pages.”
Rebecca: “Send over the contract, I am your gal!”
By page 5…I thought I would die. No, really….D…I…E…..
As in, take a letter opener, jab it into one eyeball, go stir crazy and paper cut my wrists until I bleed dry–Dead. Gone. DIE.
I didn’t know I would hate—no hate isn’t strong enough—despise, technical report writing when I sold my soul to the devil. I figured it might be boring and tedious, but I had no idea I would pray for a flesh eating bacterial infection or a bout of E.coli to get me off the hook. Nothing spells sympathetic job release like a call from the ICU in a hospital saying, “I’m sooo sorry, you’ll have to get someone else to do it, I’m conversing with death, no Wi-Fi, only IV’s.”
50 pages of mind numbing boredom. 50 pages of zero humor. I didn’t get to write the word ass one single time. I didn’t get to use a metaphor or crack a single snarky sentence over their corporate heads. I had to pay attention to grammar and use a spell check. I had to research the most boring information I’ve ever absorbed and despite the fact I became a lip strumming psycho by page 50, I fear I may have learned a few things about the Internet. Excuse me…… sorry, I think I just vomited a bit in the back of my throat.
There’s a good chance I’ll carry a mental scar for the rest of my natural born writing life. It was so painful and internally traumatic that a person just doesn’t forget and move on. I fear the next person who says to me, “Hey, you’re a writer, right?” will witness me sticking my fingers in my ears and running as fast as I can the opposite direction screaming, find a happy place, find a happy fucking place………
Did I mention it was bad and that I didn’t enjoy writing a technical report?
I did learn a few things about myself during that paid writing torture. For one, I’d fall down dead before I’d admit failure or quit something even if it feels like someone is driving tiny red hot pokers into my skull every five minutes. And two, I am NOT a writer. Not that sort. Not even close. The people who write in that field must be a special breed of super patience. Personally, I’d rather exfoliate an entire elephant with a toothbrush than suffer that sort of writing job again.
Therapy ~ This is purely part of the ”healing the writer within me”, recovery program. I’m hoping it will help settle the night terrors and occasional gag reflex I’m still suffering.
Ass, ass, ass, ass, ass…..There now, I feel better already.
