Bore Bottom

I’ve been at a temp job for the last month. A small business that builds cabinets, which requires me to be on top of measurements and have the basic capability to look at drawings. The thing is is my brain is not built that way. I can’t read a map let alone what a cabinet is supposed to look like on a wall in blueprint form. I feel so inadequate, like everyone knows I’m an idiot and I’m just making people more angry with every mistake I make on each order. Or maybe it’s just in my head.

To be fair, the training has been rather sparse. The only person who actually trained me and trained me well, quit unexpectedly a few weeks ago when she wasn’t being treated well by the owner. I’m glad she stood up for herself, but unfortunately that meant I was no longer going to be properly trained and would have to figure this out on my own. And going back to paragraph one, I’m a fucking idiot with this shit.

Even with the shoddy training, I know how my brain functions. Numbers, math, drawings—I’m just not cut out for this shit. It’s one of my biggest weaknesses and I get incredibly insecure with myself when I’m confronted with anything remotely mathematical. I’d have an easier time understanding a Bela Tarr film sans subtitles than trying to fill out a work order to build a simple cabinet.

I’ve always been jealous of people who get into STEM jobs. Maybe it’s why I’ve found myself attracted to those in that field. Secretly, I’ve always thought that maybe some of their talents would rub off on me and overnight I would be able to build some complicated mechanism that could do something functional in the every day world. STEM jobs are highly regarded, well paid, and you’re not seen as a leech in society like say someone who makes art for a living.

I’ve always been interested in the arts but I’ve never been any good at it. Not only am I interested in something that is not seen in the same light as STEM but also in a field that makes no money but sucks a lot of time out of your schedule. I have no idea what the hell I’m good at—sitting on my ass watching movies? I can’t tell a story for the life of me, I hate about 98% of my photos—how many pictures can you take of palm tree or shadows? My writing is absolute shit and I have no idea why my screenwriting professors encouraged me to keep doing it. Well, they’re educators—I don’t think it’s in their nature to discourage students from doing things in the field they’re teaching.

So it just leaves me to be a useless fuck, a leech, making a relatively okay wage, desperately trying to figure out what 19mm of Particle Board looks like and if should be cut on a router or a saw.

Or this is a simple case of PMS running amok with a couple of missteps I’ve had at work for the past few days, and I’m just riding the spiral into self-deprecation.