measuring the marigolds

wow, this is my 100th post. i’m surprised i’m still going with this.

tuesday is my last day in the office, then i start working from home. bonus, they’re giving me a raise…i wasn’t even sure i would still get paid once it turned into an “internship,” so getting a raise blows my mind a little. and they’re giving me a computer, which i now have to find a place for.

it’s going to be awesome making my own hours, getting to work in my pjs and all that, but i think the thing i’m most looking forward to is being able to hide when i call people on the phone. i have this very weird thing about calling people…it makes me so nervous, and i get all these bizarre mannerisms while talking on the phone. at work i will seriously wait until my boss is upstairs, or out to lunch, or at least talking on another line, to make phone calls. even then it stresses me out because i’m not in an enclosed, controlled environment—someone could walk in at any moment!

of course i can’t always wait until i’m alone, so then i’m even more nervous, self-consciously trying to suppress my ticks and not sound like an idiot. what makes it extra shitty is that i’ve developed this phone voice that apparently must sound exactly like a telemarketer. i try so hard to be friendly and professional, and it ends up like this:

them: “hello?”
me: “hi, this is emily with _____. how are you doing?”

then there’s this sudden drop in their voice. this awful tone of annoyance, like i’m a mosquito and they’re just waiting for me to land so they can slap me. when i call someone at work it’s often for a good reason, like inviting them to plug their business in an article or asking for their address to send a complimentary magazine. rarely am i trying to sell anything.

but mostly what bothers me is that people are so damned indecent to telemarketers. what a miserable job that must be, just trying to earn a living and people hate you for it. is it so fucking hard to be nice? to politely refuse goods and services without getting personal or snarky about it? that’s always bothered me in a big way. telemarketers are shunned like child rapists, for shit’s sake, it’s ridiculous. they’re not harming anyone at all, in fact it’s hard to imagine a more innocuous position in the job market these days.

i should make a tshirt: “have you hugged a telemarketer lately?”