Quitting

It's weird that my first blog ever would be about quitting but for me to start something new I had to quit my old habits. 

I quit my job on Friday. I had been selling auto, home, and life insurance for the past year and a half. I quit to move to L.A. and become an actress. (original right?) I have a complex about quitting jobs because of my first job out of college. I hated and hated it. I vowed to myself to stay six months and on my six month anniversary I marched into my bosses office and right before I could quit, she fired me. It was the worst feeling ever. I was literally about to hand over my letter of resignation when she pushed across her desk a check with my final wages on it. 

I was successful selling insurance so there would be no reason for them to fire me, however the morning when I arrived at work I was convinced I was getting fired. Then I heard that my manger would be in our office that morning. He normally works out of the Denver Tech Center, (the DTC, like L.A., we can make cool abbreviations too) so I had rehearsed the perfect phone dialogue to say to him with my parents and then again with my friends. Part of me thought he was coming to the office to fire me. Because I was quitting I had not sold much in the last couple weeks. 

He came into the office and set up in the conference room as usual. I was so nervous I felt I was visibly shaking. My mom always says when crazy feelings like these happen and it's hard to breath, to get control of yourself, just imagine yourself swimming. Imagine doing the breast stroke and having to take deep breaths and make even strokes, and most of the time that works...however, since I committed to acting, I wanted to really be present in these uncomfortable emotions, even if I looked like a shaking freak in front of my boss. 

I went into the conference room and closed the door. It was not a glamorous conference room. The nicest thing about it was the single French door painted white for the entrance. However, someone had put yellow caution tape across the door that read, "caution: learning in progress" so that took away from the beauty of it a little. The insurance office was in a strip mall –a dying strip mall where only discount stores flourished, the kind that sell knock off Keds...at least those are coming back in style. So, to sum up the conference room has no windows and cheesy caution tape across the door. I sat down and folded my hands in front of me and just said, "I have to give you my two weeks notice."

To me it was the hardest thing to say. Saying "no". It was almost as awful I imagine as having to say, "I want a divorce." ....too dramatic? My manager simply nodded and said "ok." OK? I lost sleep over OK? Here's the thing. I worked for a very large insurance company. One of the top five. They have invested thousands of dollars training me and I have produced very well for them, but in the end I was just one of forty thousand employees. I'm insignificant and not special. My mom would coo "oooo but you are special to me." Thank God for mothers or we really wouldn't be special. I don't matter to this boss. This boss I helped bonus, this boss I played along with at cheesy meetings, this boss who I let "coach" me as they say to make it sound like we're all on a baseball team instead of in an insurance office in a STRIP MALL! I don't matter to this boss. In L.A. they say if you quit an acting job there are always 100 girls who look just like you and better and are in line to take your place. I think it's the same in insurance. 

I told my manager I had been offered a job at the Cheesecake Factory as a food runner...in Los Angeles. I paused before I said the location for dramatic effect. He nodded  (again–what is he dead?) and seemed a little interested or maybe annoyed because now I had just interfered with his daily tasks and created some extra paperwork on his Friday. I went to go pack my things. I packed a picture of my parents two cats out in the snow. My dad had put them out as a joke and they both were looking in the window with forlorn looks on their faces. I packed my purple "Keep Boulder Weird" mug, and I packed my lamp. 

For selling a lot of life insurance I received the Lamp Lighter Award which entailed a cash bonus (what helped me move to L.A.) and an old looking wooden lamp with a parchment shade and my name on a brass plate glued to the base. It was an honor to have at my desk because it looked credible and there was no way I was leaving without it. I said my goodbyes, and my manager, true to company policy, "escorted" me out of the building/strip mall. 

I drove to L.A. the next day.