One of the many unhappy and very short jobs out there, I received this job unwillingly.
During a low point in my employment history I was regularly talking with a
temp agency who promised every day that they had great leads and those leads would have mysteriously vanished the next day. Eventually they called me and said they had "an opportunity in the sales department of the local newspaper".
This at first sounded great! I had been pursuing
journalism before my former job and even though this was probably a
desk job, it might be a foot in the door position that would lead me to writing again.
They told me to be there early afternoon for training and indeed I was there on time. It was terrible. I walk in and they immediately lead me to a desk with a
headset and autodialer. "
Just read the script and get us some new subscriptions" they said.
If it were a perfect world I would have smashed the headpiece and stormed out of there, but my former optimism had not died yet. Putting that thing on my head and pressing the Call button is still the most terrible, wretched event of my entire existence and I still wake up at night in a cold sweat over it.
It felt dirty, the bad kind of dirty. I was invading peoples lives, taking up their time, spoiling quiet afternoons, busy
home offices,
romantic interludes (ahem) and religious services, all to offer these people a special deal on a new subscription.
But
I was desperate for cash. Needed a job. Had to work. So I pressed on, hoping the feeling would go away or I could at least numb myself to it. But it didn't. I was surrounded by people who did this day in and day out and who never considered the evil inherent in the system. Finally I broke. Two hours of temporarily trashing peoples days is more than I could handle so I took off the headpiece, grabbed my coat and walked. That afternoon the temp service was dropped and I swore I would never do anything like that again.
Then I started working
Working Tech Support.