Im 26, and my wife keeps telling me I have an issue I refuse to acknowledge. She repeats it every time I leave a job or get sacked. She says its not normal for the longest Ive ever held a job to be six months and shes not wrong. Sometimes I last a month, sometimes barely a fortnight; there have been jobs where I havent even made it to the end of the probation period. Ive done all sorts maintenance, cleaning, sweeping streets, scrubbing public toilets, lugging boxes in warehouses. I always start off keen, but within days the weight of it sets in both physically and mentally.
Its not just exhaustion. Its shame. I only finished Year 11 at school, never went back. Whenever I start one of these jobs and they hand me a hi-vis vest, a broom or a mop bucket, something inside me feels like I dont belong. I watch my colleagues resigned, doing their work without complaint while I think to myself this cant be my life. So I start showing up late, slack off, find reasons to be absent, until one day Im called into the managers office and told not to come back.
My wife doesnt understand. Shes worked in a shop for four years. Doesnt earn much, but shes steady she knows exactly what shell get at the end of each month. When I come home yet again without a job, she looks at me with frustration and exhaustion. She says, Its not the work, its you. You cant stick at anything. I tell her those jobs arent for me, I was made for something else, I wasnt born to scrub toilets forever.
That only winds her up more. She insists I finish school, learn something, get qualified. No one will hire me for something else if I dont even have a certificate. I promise her Ill do it, but months pass, and I never enrol. Theres always an excuse not enough money, no time, Ill sort it later. The truth is, Im terrified of going back to school as a grown man, sitting next to teenagers, feeling like Ive missed the boat.
At home, its become routine we argue about the same things. She says I live in fantasies, talk big, but never do anything. I tell her shes given up, settled for surviving instead of living. Sometimes we yell. Sometimes we go days without speaking. I head out again, CV folded in my pocket, and come home disheartened when they tell me, Well let you know.
Worst of all, I do dream. I dream of owning my own business, answering to no one, not feeling ashamed in some uniform. I dream of getting up early for something Ive built, not just to follow orders. But dreams dont pay the rent or put food on the table. And she reminds me of that every single day.
Do I really have a problem I dont want to admit, or do I just have the right to hope for something better?
