here's a story for you.

i think i've used this picture before. but it's the only one i have of being at work.

Work. Monday, November 14, 2011.

The day started out on a rough note, which I can attribute to the fact that my supervisor, Pam, seemed to be in a bad mood, and her attitude was making me anxious. Anxiety causes me to make silly mistakes, and this definitely was not helping anything. For instance, the phone rang, and it was a man who asked to speak with Pam, and when I told her, she asked me to transfer the line. 

It was the first time I’ve ever been asked to transfer a call, so I had to hurry and look up how, but I got it transferred and it was no problem. Pam seemed to think it was a big problem, which I felt bad about, but I continued on doing my job. 

I was doing my daily little tasks, and when I finished I asked if there was anything else Pam needed me to do. She asked me to come in her office and shut the door.

I became a victim of a very dry mouth.

I went in and sat on a chair and shut the door.

She looked at me with a patronizing face and said, “I don’t think this job is a good fit for you.”

I stared at her in shock. “You don’t?”

Her face remained the same, “I don’t think the job is really clicking for you. I mean, not being able to transfer a call?”

“I’m sorry Pam, I’ve never had the opportunity to transfer a call before, so I needed to refresh my memory really quickly.”

“You’ve never had to transfer a call before?”

“No.”

“Well, it’s other things too, like when you forgot to give people their mail…?”

“It’s a long list, and It just slipped my mind, I’m sorry. I haven’t forgotten since!”

“Well what about a few weeks ago when I asked you to read through your manual and tell me if you had any questions? I never heard anything from you about it.”

“I didn’t have any questions…” I was starting to feel really weird about the conversation.

“It just seems like the job isn’t clicking for you,” she repeated. “I don’t know if it’s because you don’t like it, or because you just don’t get it, but it’s really not working out. So I think next Tuesday will be your last day.”

“Ok.” Utterly confused and shocked, I walked out of her office in a daze.

I realized that I had been fired.

Ousted.

Let go.

After only a month and a half of working at a job I loved. A month and a half of doing a job I thought I was good at. In fact, I KNEW I was good at. Pam had constantly been telling others how good I was at my job. And the mistakes she had mentioned had been one-time new-person mistakes that I definitely never made again. 

And as I continued thinking about this... I felt like something was wrong with the situation. It just seemed like pieces of the puzzle were missing.

Come to find out... I was right.

To be continued.

p.s. names have been changed.