Two jobs lost in one month already.
TRIGGER WARNING CONTENT: I Lost 2 Jobs In September 2015 (The same month!)
SECOND JOB IN JULY 2015
I needed a second job while working at Dollar General to earn extra money, you know? Right? So, on a midday day in the middle of July 2015, I headed to the Scottrade Trade Stadium across from the City Hall in downtown Saint Louis.
After I submitted my resume to Chris, the white interviewer, I politely advised him that I’d need a sign language interpreter to participate in a training program.
As he wrote, Chris responded to me in a white notebook, saying he was hesitant to consider providing an interpreter for me. Chris said he would check in with his manager first to ensure he got permission. I was like… OKAY…
While working at Dollar General, I waited for one week, but when the second week arrived after Sunday, I had to use my video phone interpreter to call Chris on Monday. Hasn’t heard from him since then.
VISITING MS. BURCH
Impulsively, I brought my concerns to my former case manager, Linda Burch, about Scottrade Center Stadium’s career field day. Ms. Burch motherly scolded me for worrying too much.
She was more sisterly up-front with me, ordering me to stop leaving so many voicemails on Chris’ phone.
Shawn: “Ah, I see. No one told me like that before, and you’re the first person telling me to leave it at one time. I didn’t think it would be a problem with two or three voicemails, but now I see the bigger picture.”
Ms. Burch: “Well, now, you know. Next time, you should wait at least in two weeks, but if you don’t get called after the second week, then you can call after the third. But it had to be one time in a day, not two or three in the same day. Okay?”
Shawn: “Yeah, but no one bothers help me, not even my family. I thought I had figured it all out. I mean, why did I have to go through this alone? I felt like everyone left me in the dark. All I know is that I’m responsible for my own life if I wanted to get a second job.
That is all that I know, and doing alone isn’t always successful for me, just sayin’.”
Ms. Burch: “Oh, okay… I’m sorry that you didn’t have the proper tools to handle alone. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner when you were my trainee in this program before you got hired at Dollar General.
I thought you knew what to do on your own, and we do normally help people, but if or when is looking for the second job, you would have to do it on your own. We want everyone to learn independently. You did a good job on your own, though. You should be proud of yourself for that.
Don’t give up, keep trying, maybe, you’d notice something you like.”
Even though I was NEVER hired at Scottrade Center to work as a janitor, and took me too long to realize that I shouldn’t have sent too many voicemails in a single day. Oh, well! There goes my life.
I Temporarily livED with mAMA.
The first week of August 2015 was when I already turned twenty-third on the Eighth day. However, I temporarily lived with my mother in Riverview, Missouri, during the last week of August. It didn’t last that long.
I chose to stay with my mother because I could not pay my electricity and gas bills in my own apartment with so little money from one job. I became so procrastinated and lazy.
So, I visited my mother for the whole month of August while my utilities were turned off due to the insufficient wages I got from the job. I was unable to watch TV or use the Internet, and I failed to take a shower in hot water.
Every time I started complaining to Brittany about the little money I made from the same job I worked, she wouldn’t let me work any more extra after 1 PM. I still had to go home at 1 PM, so I earned less in the morning.
According to the religious convictions of my previous supervisor, who later terminated me on September 15th, she would only allow me to work additional hours if I claimed to be homophobic, straight, and ultimately, married to a Christian woman with biological children.
I had a hard time paying the rent on my apartment on Folsom Avenue. I almost always got late every month in that year alone.
While we’re on the subject of irony, I was also confronted with a piece of unexpected and unforeseen news concerning my rent from another agency that had previously owned my apartment: Efthim Company Realtors.
But now, it’s Deca Realty Company that purchased my apartment, so these new landlords required me to go through the same process of signing my name on a new term of the lease again.
I couldn’t believe how much I went through my awkward experience with the new landlord, which was a bit too surreal for me then.
I didn’t have the luxury of taking the time to think about what was going on with the rent back then.
My family NEVER helps me pay my own rent because they absolutely want me to live independently, which I didn’t enjoy doing on my own.