My voice went to Bangladesh with the dog.

So. It's 9:30 on a Friday morning, and I am @ home. I should be @ work right now, but unfortunately, I cannot be, as my voice decided to take a vacation to Bangladesh, and didn't want the rest of me tagging along. I can barely manage a whisper @ this point. It's kind of hard to show up to work like this when your job requires you to talk to people all day long. I'd be there if I knew that they'd let me work offline, do reports, commitments, whatever. But I've been there for four years and I've ever only been invited to help with 1 report, and that's because our systems were down and we were not able to take phone calls. Meanwhile, other teams in the call center have people offline all the time for various reports. Others get to go offline whenever the queues die down. I've asked if there are reports I can do, but I always get the same answer: "Your job is to take phone calls. That's what the company pays you for." Lovely.
So, I'll go to work later today and collect my paycheck and try not to spend it all in one place. Pay some bills. Clean the house. Mikey's off today too, so cleaning the house may not happen... I never seem to be able to do that when he's home. We'll see what happens.

Where did my Mojo go?

It's been a while since I forced myself to transpose the cacophony of thoughts in my head to paper or canvas...especially canvas. Not sure why, but since I moved to Texas over 4 years ago, the inspiration that I once possessed has withered away, and it saddens me greatly. I don't know if it's the mundane task of working a "normal" job, employed by corporate America, or the lack of any substantial artistic community in this town, the absence of any like-minded artists to challenge my methods and techniques, or if it's that I've lost my "mojo." I want it back.

Back home, in Rhode Island, I was surrounded by fellow artists and had the support of family and friends, people that I've grown with, people that have accompanied me on the journey and watched my portfolio morph from the sketches of an eager young girl who wanted so badly to be an artist she could taste it to the paintings and drawings of a more educated young woman, ambitious and slightly more sophisticated in technique. Though i lived in my parents' small home with two sisters and a brother, i felt as though i had so much more space to create. I could make a 10 minute drive into Providence, sit at the cafe at AS220 on monday nights, and for $5, sketch and freely draw nude figures with other artists. We'd listen to jazz or blues or local bands through the cafe's sound system, while the model tried to get into a comfortable position. We'd talk about studio space and marvel at the mediums some of us used. There were hand-rolled cigarettes smoked on breaks and free coffee at the bar, and there was alway someone new that showed up randomly to challenge each of us in a new way. And the thing about AS220 was that not only was it a cafe and a venue for musicians, it was also an artist's residence, gallery, and studio. Upstairs, several lucky artists lived and worked on their art. In the basement, a silkscreening studio was bursting with prints and posters for local causes, bands, events, and the like. Every now and then, AS220 would host a show for local artists, usually in conjunction with Providence's growing Gallery Night, one thursday evening each month when the trolleys were free and the galleries around the city were free and open to the public. It was always eye-opening.

In Wichita Falls, on the other hand, there is a deafening absence of community support for the arts. There is a college, Midwestern State, and there is a "museum" of the arts here, but you hardly ever hear about any art shows or events. I suppose it comes down to the fact that the arts are simply not as important here as football or church. It's much more difficult to be creative when there's no demand for you to do so, nothing pushing you to be more than a customer service representative for a billion dollar company.

I loathe my job. Loathe is not a strong enough word. In fact, I doubt that there is a word strong enough for how much I truly resent my job. In a nutshell, my job is to collect on past due accounts when customers call in about their wireless service. I make payment arrangements when necessary, collect payments, change rate plans, add features...recently I volunteered for an additional responsibility: making deposit decisions on new lines of service. That part's not so bad. I don't have to talk to the actual customers, just the agents in different locations. I could deal with that. There's not really much argument when it comes to that part of the job. But when it comes to dealing with customers, they are a different animal.

The majority of the people that I speak with on a daily basis are the bottom 5% of our entire customer base. They are the past due customers. They are the people that feel we owe them somehow. They are rude, they are belligerent, obnoxious, vile people. They lie, they scream, they cuss, they intimidate until they get what they want, and if you are not willing to give it to them, then, by God, they will escalate to a manager until they do. And, truth be told, if all it took to do my job was listen to them, see what they need, and attempt to compromise, I probably would not have a problem doing so. The part that I hate is when the company grades our calls. I understand why they do it, to make sure that the customers are being treated properly, that they are not being abused by rogue representatives. But the quality assurance that our company puts us through is ridiculous. Not only must we mention the past due balance, we must also advise the customer of the full balance, for a bill that may not be due for almost another month, in most instances. Additionally, we must mention the fact that if the arrangements that we agree to are not kept, their service may be at risk for suspension, accompanied by a restoral fee and an inability to make payment arrangements for 6 months (which is hardly ever enforced). We must advise of late fees, payment administrative fees, early termination fees when applicable, along with their due dates and cycle dates. We must address the customer by name and ask permission to do so. We must apologize to the customer @ every opportunity. We must ask if any of their contact information has changed, even if they just got through telling you that they were transferred from another department, or that they just finished speaking with another rep and the call dropped. We must ask if they would like to add another contact number to the account, so that we may call them when delinquent. We must never tell the customer that we are required to do any of these things, or tell them that they reached the collections department. That would make the company look bad. We must search to see if the customer has any other accounts that are past due, and make sure to let them know that those other potential past due balances could also affect their service. In many cases, we find accounts that are 10+ years old. Mention that account and the possibility of interruption, and the call will surely last for @ least 15 minutes more than it should have. The sad part is, we know that accounts that have been cancelled for 7 or more years will no longer affect their credit, as it drops off. And if the customer does not want to talk about their balances, we must continue to advise them about the risks of being delinquent, even after they tell you outright that they called in to troubleshoot their device, and that someone else is responsible for the payment of their bill. We get points deducted for failing to do any of these tasks. Oh yes, and we must also meet our daily statistics at the same time. The total number of calls must average less than 420 seconds, less than 20% of your calls for the day must result in transfers, you must have fewer than 10% last less than 20 seconds, and all of these stats play a role in your availability for the day. Bathroom breaks must be kept @ a minimum if you expect to meet your availability for the day.

It's mind-numbing work. It is detestable work. But it pays the bills. And at this time in my life, the responsibility of keeping a roof over my head and food in the fridge is significantly more important than the inspiration of knowing that I could be doing more with my life. In time, I'm sure my creative juices will start flowing again. At least I'm hoping so.