Tag: decisions

#oneaday Day 68: What Now?

It’s coming up on a year since my departure from the obnoxiously-named “world of work”, when I left my employment at a primary school, went to PAX East and had what was to this day the happiest week of my life, then came home only for my life to completely fall to pieces two short months later.

Now, here I am, and some things have changed, and some things aren’t any further along than they were even back then. I have some awesome new people of various descriptions in my life, for one thing, and while most of them are some distance away, none of them are so far away as to make it completely impractical to go and see them. This is a Good Thing.

I also have a sweet writing gig that I’m absolutely loving. I enjoy doing the news posts every day and I’ve had great fun at the events I’ve had the opportunity to attend so far. This is also a Good Thing.

But I get the impression that some Decisions are going to have to be Made at some point. How much do I want to be a writer in the games industry? Quite a lot, as it happens. Despite having been technically “unemployed” for the last year, I’ve been doing a lot of writing and I haven’t reached that “jaded” stage that some writers have got to—the stage where they’ve forgotten to have fun with what was once their hobby. I don’t see myself getting to that point any time soon because I’m a fan of games, the games industry and everything it involves, and hopefully that comes across in my writing. I believe that I’m a good writer and a valuable addition to any of the teams I’ve been part of over the years, and friends and colleagues would (hopefully) back me up on that front. I certainly have a heap of LinkedIn recommendations that would attest to this.

So what’s the problem? Well, as much as I love it, it’s not a full-time gig… at the moment, anyway. Making it into a full-time gig would likely, at this time anyway, involve having to whore myself around to a number of outlets on a freelance basis, without any particular guarantee of a particular amount of money coming in each month. I wouldn’t have a problem with this were it not for the fact that the events of the last year have left me in a terrible state financially. The thing I find myself constantly coming back to is whether I should leave behind “the dream” and get a full-time job instead. Practically speaking, it’s the thing that would probably make most financial sense, and anyway, there’s nothing to say I can’t continue contributing to sites on a freelance basis while I hold down another job.

So I have been applying for jobs. And applying. And applying. And tweaking my CV and cover letter and trying new templates and writing in different styles. And nothing. This is immensely frustrating as I know that I am Good At Stuff. But on paper I am qualified for just two things: writing and teaching. Teaching I have no desire to go back to as it’s nearly killed me on two separate occasions, but I have a lingering fear that it’s the only career path I can all but guarantee I’ll be able to find myself a position in. I’ve held three teaching jobs in the past, all of which were in schools that could politely be described as “challenging” and as such my perception of the profession may have been coloured in a slightly negative light. But I’m not sure I want to risk my sanity and happiness (well, potential happiness, anyway) diving back in “just to see” if I was just imagining it was as awful as I thought it was.

In summary, I’m not sure what I “should” do. A job’s a job, after all, and anything that gets some money coming in is surely better than doing nothing and having no money coming in whatsoever. My quandary is this, then: after this long out of full-time work, should I continue looking for that elusive something that’s going to make me happy? Or after this long, should I just take whatever the hell I can get?

And are you hiring?

#oneaday, Day 175: Please Insert Disc 2

Every day, it feels more and more like life is coming to the end of a chapter. No-one has said that irritating “as one door closes, another one opens” truism at me this time around, but I’m sure more than a few people have thought it. But the fact is, things are coming to a conclusion here. As much as  I hate the thought of it, it’s looking like the “Southampton” chapter of my life is coming to an end. At some point in the next couple of months, it will be time to save my game, swap discs and enter a brand new tomorrow. Whether Disc 2 contains the same geography and different cutscenes or a whole new world map to explore remains to be seen. But it’s going to happen, regardless, and there’s nothing I can do about that. Events that were set in motion over a year ago have brought things to this stage. It sucks, but the best way through it is to just grit one’s teeth and shoulderbarge through it, hoping that nothing grabs on and bites me in the neck or anything.

My metaphors are getting more and more mixed and tortured, so I’ll stop that there. Let’s just say that tomorrow is going to be the beginning of the end of this chapter. I’m going to put my notice in on my flat. I can’t afford it by myself. And I don’t like to be a drain on my parents’ resources, as awesome as they have been to me. More to the point, cutting all ties with the past will be much easier once this place, full of those crystallised memories as it still is, is left behind.

The beginning of the next chapter is what is not clear. On Friday, I have a job interview. This job is based in Bristol. I have nothing against Bristol, and in fact have two friends who live there already and like it very much. But something doesn’t quite feel “right” about this job. I can’t explain it. It’s like a feeling in my gut. “Don’t do this,” it says. “It’s not right. However good the pay is.”

After some careful consideration and the advice of a close friend, I’m going to do the interview anyway and scope out the company. Unlike past interviews I’ve had for school-based positions, “real jobs” don’t tend to put you on the spot and insist you take or leave it straight away. Or so I’m led to believe, anyway. If nothing else, there should be a waiting period while they deliberate and do whatever they do with ticklists, points systems, dark sacrifices and… hey, I’ve never recruited anyone, all right? I have no idea how it works. In that time, I can reflect on whether or not it’s the right thing to do.

The alternatives are as follows.

1. To find a cheap crappy flat here in Southampton and pray that another job I applied for today comes off. Said job is based in Reading, which is in commuting distance of Southampton. I could move to Reading, but I really don’t want to as it’s a shithole. Job in question is right up my alley, though, and paid well. It was only advertised a few days ago, though, so it may be some time before I hear from that.

2. To move back home for a while. To that end, my good buddy Edd has promised to put in a good word for me at his place of employment in Cambridge. I have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, moving back home will be a good way to raise some money, get back on my feet and basically deal with all this. On the other hand, it means leaving behind people who are very important to me. I can always go and visit them, sure, but it’s not the same as knowing they’re just around the corner from me. Cambridge is a long way from Southampton. At the same time, though, I get to hang out with people I haven’t had the chance to hang out with for extended periods of time for ages.

3. To look somewhere completely different. I’ve pretty much ruled this one out. If I don’t get the Bristol gig, I’m not moving to an unfamiliar city if at all possible.

It’s a difficult situation, but the sooner I come to terms with the fact that dealing with it is going to involve some sacrifices—God knows I’ve had to put up with enough of those already—the better.

Here’s a promise then: by Day 200 on this blog, decisions will have been made and my path will have been set. For better or worse.