You know what? I'm done. I'm just done. It's late, I'm cranky, a boy I used to be friends with passed away earlier this week, and I just don't wanna deal with anything right now. I'm done. I wash my hands of this, I'm going to sleep.
It's not my job for everyone to like me. It's my job to do my job
This job is hard. It's time-consuming, I don't get enough sleep, I don't have time to breathe, I'm stressed out all the time, and I feel entirely too under-appreciated. Every night on rounds I overhear someone on some floor saying something derogatory about the RAs. You know what? Try your life without RAs and see what happens. I work my butt off at this job so that the some 2000 residents who live here can be safe, and happy, and healthy, and have things to do. I sacrifice my sleep, my health, my time, my social life, and you know what, sometimes even my grades and my sanity, for this job. I don't have to do this. I do it because I want to. And you know what, sometimes I forget why. Sometimes I'm tired and cranky and stressed and behind in all my classes and all my RA work and short on sleep and exhausted and drained and overwhelmed and overworked and a friend of mine commits suicide and I can't remember why I signed up to do this job in the first place. Maybe just the *tiniest* shred of respect or appreciation would be nice.
You know what? I'm a person, too. I'm a third year undergrad with senior standing. I'm double majoring and double minoring, and I'm going to have stay over an extra year because I have way too much on my plate but I'm pretty sure my scholarship and loans will run out after my fourth year, and I have no idea how I'm going to be able to pay off my loans because hey guess what, I decided I wanted to be an actress and major in theatre and I'm probably going to move to New York and live in a crappy run-down apartment living off of leftover take-out and Easy Mac and wait tables whilst attempting to break into the business. I like the color purple, I hate oranges, there's only a handful of shades of green that I can stand, I like coffee, I have asthma, my mom works in a hospital and my dad at a steel mill, I have an older brother and a younger brother, and I miss my family terribly, my best friend and I met playing Lite Brite in preschool, I was born six weeks premature, I play a whole bunch of instruments because I love it, I'm afraid of the dark, of being alone, of tornadoes, and hospitals, I'm almost always sick, I have a psychological disorder that I manage without medication because I don't like the medication, I've been dyeing my hair since I was seventeen, I love shoes, I kind of want to join the Peace Corps, I like watching movies, I've recently become obsessed with the show Lie to Me, I don't like being mean, I am terrified for where the rest of my life is going to take me, and I have unwavering faith in the existence of God and the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
I'm a real person, I promise. So when you look at me, don't just look at me and see my walkie-talkie and my nametag. I am not just "RA" or "Landes 2." My name is Elizabeth, and I'm a person, and I'm working hard at school and at this job because I want to. For just two seconds, can everyone understand that? Please? Because I'm about to cry with everything coming in at me from all sides all at the same time. I want to go home. I want to lay in my mom's bed and watch Chelsea Lately with her and get a hug and a home-cooked meal and a shower without shoes and to not have to be responsible for 2000 other people. I love this job, but sometimes I can't remember why. I love this job, but right now it's killing me. I need a minute to breathe. I can't breathe.
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