I’m really bad at avoiding being cynical.

And that really sucks.

The following is a comment from a reddit thread. I suggest reading the thread until you get to this one, but this one is the most important thing I’ve read recently.

Fuck, I have been battling bedbugs for three weeks, and I was ready to crucify the people in the original picture just like everyone else. But once I got to the end of that comment:

“…Everyone is doing their best. If they are doing a bad job it’s because they don’t know how to do it better. Whether it’s knowledge, depression, mental illness, shitty upbringing. It’s their best, as terrible as it may be.”

It makes me remember the fact that I graduated from college right when people with my degree had been flooding back in to my industry after they took a break during the financial crisis. I have since abandoned any hope of getting back to any kind of social service/mental health unless I become independently wealthy. Since then I’ve been jumping from one job to another, just to keep my household afloat – and even that is once again coming under fire. If you look at my resume` without really asking “why in the world has this guy been in traffic control and in a preschool?” then many people would assume that I just can’t hold a proper job long-term. The truth is that I have had to face really hard facts at really inconvenient moments in my life.

My point is: I’m doing my best, but I often get nervous that people don’t always see that – I get nervous they will see me as lazy. Or as ‘not motivated’. Or as ‘entitled’. Or even as ‘just another loser’. But goddamit, I’m doing my best. I need to be making more money, but man there are some really important things that I’ve had to sacrifice. Sometimes the thing I have to give up is financial security. It’s a lot better to give that up and rest easy than to know that you weren’t there when someone depended on you. For me, that trade has leveled a hefty bill in my direction, but I think it’s been worth it.

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