The New Job Begins

Like a lot of folks, I've never really known what I want to do with my life. It always seemed to change day to day, depending upon what cool film or book I'd recently read. This used to worry me a lot, especially in the education years, when apparently everyone was planning their career path with military like precision. Or at least that's what the career planners would have you believe; what I saw was a bunch of kids just as confused as me, with a few of them genuinely knowing what they wanted to do, and the rest just doing whatever their parents wanted them.

I think the key problem I've always had is that I'm interested in too many things, like a magpie is interested in the shiny. Some would say "fickle" - I would say versatile. The idea of only doing one thing for the rest of my days makes me hyperventilate in terror. This inevitably means I've tended to accidentally end up in jobs, just so I have money coming in but with the hope I may be able to make something of it and possibly, if the wind blows the right way, even enjoy it.

This is how I became a manager for a Catalogue team for LOVEFiLM way back in 2007, after nearly three years in the customer services section. Catalogue work mainly involves trying to keep up with the latest DVD/Blu-ray release schedules so that people can add them to a rental list, and we can send that title to them after they send the last one back. If you don't know how online DVD rental works by now you likely never will, as it seems to have had its heyday and is inevitably being superseded by streaming. I've had the same four discs sitting in my living room for… two weeks? Three? A while anyway. And I continually forget to send them back. [Note to self: put those discs in an envelope and in your bag!] I still get to watch cool stuff via online rental though, so will keep it up as long as it's on offer. And as long as I get my staff discount…

Even without the dawning of a new age I've been wanting to move on to do something else for a while now. I don't want much from my day job, but the bear minimum is to be intellectually challenged and busy. Neither of these things have been happening with any regularity for years now. Finally though, after many job applications and many disappointments, I have got another role to move into, starting today. And I don't even have to change building as I got a position with the Merchandising team for Amazon Instant Video. Yep, that's right; I work for the megalith, big bad/last great hope, saviour of books/destroyer of books, Amazon. My desire to be self-published and a successful novelist came first but it has crossed my mind that it won't hurt being one floor below the Kindle team.

It's been a strange path, and I have been super sad to say goodbye to some amazing people who have moved onto new pastures these last few months. But I'll admit it; I'm pleased I get to stay at Amazon. It's going to be really odd to not know what I'm doing, after so long being able to sleepwalk my way through the day, but I couldn't be happier. I'm already seeing the shift it's caused in my extracurricular activities. There's nothing more destructive to creativity than being bored all day long (this is true for me at any rate) and the writing has definitely benefited from my brain being bamboozled during these last few weeks when I've been learning about the new job. I have no doubt there will be challenging days ahead* but I feel that not only have I moved in the right direction, but that I once again have a direction to move in. Not bad for someone who's still winging it.


*I can hear everyone I work with laughing and someone saying "You know nothing Jon Snow".