It's OK to be unhappy

I know I can attribute a goodly portion of my depressions past to the feeling that if I'm not happy, I'm doing something wrong or there is something wrong with me. But unhappiness is a perfectly normal part of life, and it stops being so terrible once you learn to accept that it's ok. Like right now, I'm unhappy, but it's ok. My feelings are valid and rational and the thing that's making me so unhappy is likely to not go away for a few more months and so I may be miserable for a few more months. Crying and complaining are healthy reactions.

It's official: I hate my job. I was trying very hard not to declare this prematurely, but it has me cranky and miserable. I'm just so tired all the time but without ever feeling like I've done something. There's no sense of accomplishment ever but I go home sore and unhappy, and I feel like I'm stuck, so that makes it even worse. I still like my boss and my crazy co-worker and seeing my cousin, but I'm completely burnt out and it's only been three weeks and I'm counting down the days until January. I feel like I'm always having to do 12 things at once and if I stop to take a breath I won't be ready for whatever thing I have to do next and it gets treated like the end of the world when it's just not that important. I'm selling theatre-goers food and drinks. Big friggin' deal. But from the moment I get there to the moment I leave it's RUN RUN RUN RUSH RUSH RUSH and customers are rude and annoyed and return my plastered-on smile with scowls and a sense of entitlement and leave a mess in their wake and don't tip. And now I'm getting all these promo invitations for things that pay $14, $17, and $25 an hour that I can't do because I'm scheduled to work for $8 an hour and we're already understaffed and I don't want to screw over my co-workers because they, too, are overworked and underpaid and they're the ones I like. And now that I backed out of the promo from last weekend and have to turn down all these offers I'm less likely to get work from them in the future. It just seems ridiculous that I'm stuck working 40 hours a week doing something I hate when I could work like 16 hours doing something I enjoy and get the same money. I know the promo work is inconsistent and can't be counted on, but at least I wasn't crying on the El ride home and unable to do the things I actually care about, like writing. Like I'm almost glad I haven't heard back from the Playboy people because I wouldn't have time to do anything for the article right now. I haven't touched any of it since I started the bartending job. I spent most of today asleep and it wasn't enough. And this whole thing is just so frustrating because I was unemployed for so long and it's good and important that I am making money again but the promo stuff was just starting to make me money, too, and it didn't make me hate my life. And even if the promo stuff made me double the money, my mom is much happier with me having a consistent job. I am not much happier, but when the things that she thinks should make me happy don't, she has a very hard time comprehending the situation. I talked to her on the phone tonight and she started commenting on how I just like complaining because I didn't like being unemployed but I now I'm complaining about my job. I fell apart. But when she tried her standard "Look on the bright side/these are the reasons you shouldn't be glum/I will invalidate your feelings now" thing, I stopped her and said "Can you please just say 'that sucks' and let it be ok that it sucks?" At first she tried to fight me on it, but I reminded her of our conversation the other day about how sometimes things will suck and you'll have to do them and live through them, anyway, and that's OK. You don't have to pretend they're "not so bad" or try to ignore the sucky parts. They are entitled to suck and you are entitled to be unhappy. I don't know if she understood or internalized any of it, but at least she shut up.

I so don't want to have to be at work in 11 hours. Shoot me.