Today has all the makings of “a day.”
First, I get an emailing denying a 4-hour punch-card request to make up for 4 hours I did not record last week. The reason it’s denied? It’s our responsibility to manage our punch-ins, and my supervisor has been reminding me several times all week to go in and do so. Superficially, fair enough. But it’s deeper than that.
One of the first things I relayed to my supervisor when I got hired was how I’m terrible at the punching in and out. It’s not at a box you have to pass physically, it’s just signing into your phone. Well, my phone, even when I set alerts, even when I program the calendar, likes to pause, silence, or ignore my settings. So, when my A.D.D. self is particularly tired or distracted or has literally anything trying for my attention, I’m gonna miss a punch, which happens a lot.
For months, this has been alleviated just fine, either by her in the old system, or by me in the new. Well, 6 months later, I finally miss a day to correct, and my paycheck is 4 hours short. I already get paid terribly, and when you’re missing a tank of gas or two when you commute an hour each way to work, it stings. It stings more when you accidentally miss a MANDATORY meeting because you’re at your second job, you know, because one isn’t enough, and instead of just not getting paid for the 1.5 hours they did things like hand out “employee appreciation” totes (in lieu of money or courtesy), she insists you use 1.5 of your personal time or vacation time hours because, again, that meeting was MANDATORY. A meeting so mandatory, one of the three supervisors that’s supposed to be there has blown off twice.
I’m surrounded by a lot of people pretending to be adults, pretending to care, pretending there’s any sense or order about the rules and expectations, and pretending they’re exercising their power with any tact or wisdom. My job bleeds staff every few months. My job gets sued regularly for negligent behavior at its different sites. My job worked aggressively to excuse the violent behavior of children in its care for as long as it could, pinning it on us and the idea that we weren’t being “inclusive” and “accommodating” enough to kids that would feature in an episode of interventionist TV. My high-school kid employee, religious para-professional otherwise housewife, and spouse of someone recently swept up by ICE are expected to dutifully handle getting hit or pulled on and demanded of every day. They’re supposed to 1-on-1 deal with “behaviors” for 3 hours, whilst presumably ignoring every other child in the program as they pretend to be educated or certified in that level of attention and care. Cool.
The YMCA is a global brand. They have money. They still raise more off the backs of their poorest families. They refuse to pay employees enough to retain them or train them to do things like keep the kids clean if they shit themselves. They refused to hire the kind of help it would take to monopolize a child’s attention so the room could otherwise function. The latest kid to cause a notable disruption I was castigated for including his teachers in attempting to redirect and calm him down because it was after school. God forbid I include the alleged professionals when our ridiculous unworkable YMCA “plan,” which includes a license to hit other participants, somehow, doesn’t appear to be working.
My supervisor, also underpaid and overworked, I feel defaults to this kind of robot or brick-wall just mouthing words she knows doesn’t make sense and doesn’t believe in. She’s younger, looks perpetually overwhelmed, and has shown herself unable to even just generally lead or communicate, let alone engage in an adult human level with her other adult, and often more experienced, leaders. Today is just one of dozens of emails I’ve gotten that tout, so disingenuously, some “letter of the law” kind of sentiment where some common sense and grace would do. I finally broke, and pulled into a parking lot to write her a digression about how much I struggle with what feels like being completely abandoned by her. How every time I need something from her, it’s the hard way or some stupid tit-for-tat fight or pedantic debate. I could quit tomorrow with what I anticipate her response will be.
Bear in mind, I have her behavior and responses I can compare directly against another sometimes supervisor, also young, also with her own frustrating blind-spots and peculiarities, who has been demonstrably better. I can also compare her to my newest supervisor who has shown a level of understanding and support I’ve almost never found save for one or two people at DCS, and then way back in the day at Showplace. So while I have her needling in the background, something else comes in.
A parent emails her and me about how she thinks I’m “annoyed” by her special needs child and have made it my goal to remove kids from the program who have elevated needs. She alleges we’re not following or enforcing the right plans for ensuring her son can continue to participate. This is a child who is weirdly strong, and been forceful with my tiny staff who relayed their fear in the past. This is a kid who has held up items about to swing on me with them. This is a kid who has left the room to run outside. This is a kid who, his mother has stated plainly, has a condition that severely impedes his ability to control impulses. I’ve ripped up a write-up he absolutely deserved at one point, months ago, in an effort to accommodate and be patient and incorporate information mom was then willing to share. Someone, that write-up rip up guy is also targeting her kid. Her kid was targeted by the last site director, so naturally I am too, and I waited until 3 weeks before school was out to turn the screws.
Do I have any faith my supervisor will back me up? Doubtful. I suspect from mom’s response to mine that she at least played it neutral, but this is a girl I had to fight for 3 months about a child who, every single day, would have total meltdowns, screaming for 20 to 30 minutes stints, kicking and hitting tables, tearing things off the walls, and throwing things at other kids in response to staff asking him to sit down or line up for the bathroom. When I explained my plight in front of her boss, a complete 180 and now it’s, “You know I supported you!” No, I articulated your negligence to someone who, ultimately, doesn’t even really care to be bothered.
There’s much I can assume my supervisor doesn’t give a shit about regarding my life or what contributes to my ability to meet their professed aims. During my interview, it was a running joke all of the second and third jobs the rest of the site director’s had because, “You know, the job doesn’t pay much. Seriously, you get that right? Ha ha! We all work so much! We just believe in these kids and the mission!” That’s all fun and games until the practical reality and small asks I make to be accommodated come to fruition. Then, “You’re expected to be X Y Z, as we discussed during your interview.” Yeah, bitch, along with 100 other things you conveniently forget when it suits you.
I’ve been actively making peace with the shit all adults have to eat about their broad cliche levels of negligence, laziness, incoherence, and waste of most work environments. I was finding my pace and routine and setting up to just kinda ride. But then I get these emails. Then I find myself needing to negotiate time or a space. And it’s like a triggering event that just spikes my sense of absurdity, angst, and exhaustion. I’m already eating shit, just like you, why are you making me dance? Why do I need to be punished on top of the struggle?
The answer, always, of course, is because I am an unyielding puncture through the artifice of their farce. When you learn how to behave, play along, and survive by unshakeable allegiance to The Party, any remote criticism or ask to be “human” is an invitation to the whole world behind it of taking larger chunks of responsibility. We don't have a basically functional culture that can pronounce words like “responsibility” or “accountability.” Why would some helpless 27-year old who’s had exactly one job, pretending to be a leader at the Y, find the inclination for a robust longstanding and reasonable human professional partnership? She got an even shittier education than you, was encultured by the shameless and insecure, and is now terrified of literally everything I say to her. That doesn’t feel “winnable” or like a real problem to be solved.
Therefore, I take it day by day. My power remains in my ability to explore the entire world of possibilities I’m otherwise ignoring by staying plugged into this system. I’ve got my head to barely above water when it comes to bill-paying. I have the 2nd job I can always up my hours with, or I can situate around some other pursuit. I can’t escape the thought that maybe life does, indeed, have to* be this way for some mysterious reason the further you pan out. Maybe each new little ridiculous or hellish scene is just driving me to an inevitable destiny. A destiny it’s impossible to see as I contemplate the guilt of a mother who wishes she’d aborted her special needs child. A fate I won’t find beating up on the lost skinny white girls with all of my questions and criticisms of their intransigence and naivety.
As I contemplate this, I learn my cousin is about to die. I’m considering telling my job it’s my brother and taking bereavement time. I’m sure they’ll ask for a death certificate.
No comments:
Post a Comment