My Cloven Hoof Problem

Everyone has at least one thing they struggle with. For many, it's smoking or overeating. For others, it's an addiction to zombie dinosaur fan fiction or living in a gas station bathroom because you found a spider in your apartment and it disappeared, and there's no way you can go back there until you know that thing is dead and isn't breeding thousands of children that are going to crawl on you when you fall asleep.. Whatever the severity of your problem is, we all wake up and face a certain challenge every day.


While I have a whole host of issues to choose from, my most crippling debilitation is writing zombie dinosaur fan fiction social anxiety. For those of you that don't suffer from this delightful condition, let me paint you a picture. Imagine everything you do in your daily life, such as talking to people or leaving your house, and then add a thick layer of lipid fear to those scenarios. Think you're gonna go to the store today? HA, no, there's someone there waiting to judge you for walking around in penguin pajamas because taking a shower requires too much effort, and the towels are all the way over there.

That phone's ringing? Well, it's about to go to voice mail, because the moment you answer, you're going to start babbling like an idiot, sputtering one incoherent sentence after another, until the person on the other line realizes they've just reached some sort of invalid who should not be allowed to answer the phone. 

Personally, the main things that I find terrifying are phones and jobs. Which is not exactly what I would consider convenient things to be afraid of. You need a job to afford things like food and new computers, and phones to communicate with the world outside of your four-walled safety blanket.

Why are phones scary? I have no clue. There's something about answering a phone and talking to a total stranger that gives me a combination of indigestion and flop sweat. Caller ID helps, but if the number is blocked or I don't recognize it, I go through a complete and total rundown of every possible outcome as I decide whether or not to answer the phone. What if it's a Nigerian prince calling to tell me I just inherited millions of dollars? Then I should probably answer it, I've always wanted millions of dollars. But on the other hand, what if it's someone just waiting on the other line to insult and judge me for daring to answer the phone?

In my mind, it's usually the latter. In reality, it's never the former. My aversion to phones might be explained when I realize that answering it is in no way beneficial to me, and in an attempt to keep my 20-year laziness streak running, I have now formed a spine-chilling fear of doing anything I don't absolutely have to do.

At 20 years old, I have only had one job. I worked at a grocery store called Trader Joe's for about nine months, and while I plan on dedicating at least one post to the things I encountered there, it deserves mention in this post in particular.

Have you noticed a lot of alliteration so far? It's bothering me, but not enough to go back and change anything. Laziness has defeated my self criticism this round.

So while I worked there, I had what I would call daily panic attacks as I woke up and realized I had work that day. I would spend hours hyperventilating and sweating profusely as I mentally prepared myself for customers asking if the corned beef had any pork in it, and in case you're wondering, no, it did not. 

Something about working with a combination of managers potentially judging me for not working hard enough and customers judging me for trying my hardest to appear unafraid of them, even though my uncontrollable nervousness and deer-in-the-headlights look every time one of them approached me probably gave it away, had me in a state of panic on a regular basis.

If that poorly drawn deer does not permanently welcome me into your heart out of adoration and sympathy, then I don't know what will.

I won't get into the details of what led to my quitting that job, since I might be saving that for a future post, but the above is a very detailed reenactment of what happened on an almost daily basis. Now that I no longer have a job, I'm left with a very small amount of constantly-dwindling funds in my bank account. Finding another job terrifies me more than I'm comfortable to admit, but it has allowed me to waste even more time doodling for you.

So now, I'm left with either living a life of dependency and hoboism, or facing my fears and finding a new job at some point. For the time being, I'm trying to find ways to get paid for being a recluse. I'm wondering if it's possible to put "hermit" on a job application. It would most likely hurt me more than help me, because I doubt a potential employer would find me very appealing once I started to explain the likenesses between myself and Boo Radley, minus the dendrophilia and penchant for children.