The Night Economy

10 years ago, if you were part of the night economy, most probably you were working in a convenience store, restaurant, bar, or a not-so-wholesome establishment. That's all changed now. With the emergence of call centers, a lot of people find themselves having to work on the graveyard shift.

I now find myself working in a call center. Since I find myself still emotionally incapable of handling a normal job in the "conventional" corporate world, I decided to give this new job a shot. I don't take calls though. I work as a Trainer. I don't teach people though to develop fake American accents. I teach them the business skills to make them do their jobs better.

I've only been there for less than a month, but I've already had a lot of interesting experiences. From day 1, i had to make a lot of adjustments since this is a completely different world from one that I was used to. Here, anything goes and people are a little more relaxed than others. I am only required to work for 8 hours a day/5 days a week and no one from work has ever called me on my cellphone. I can go to work in formal office wear or go in my rattiest shirt and jeans depending on my mood.

I go to work when everyone is on their way home and go home when everyone is on their way to work. I'm still in the mall almost every single day, but it's during the quiet hours when everyone is still slaving away at the office. I still get to see the sun though because I make it a point to go to the gym after my shift. Plus, whatever time I slept that morning, I always wake up at 4 pm.

So far, I am enjoying my job. I am occasionally stressed out because of certain important deadlines. That's because I'm still currently in the process of building and designing the training materials for the training program I'm supposed to deliver by Feb. 15. There's also the whole murky issue of office politics that I found myself right in the middle of from Day 1. Other than that, I'm a lot more relaxed now. Plus, I finally have the time to indulge myself in my other hobbies outside of work and go the gym as often I want to.

I think I can say I've lived a pretty interesting life so far. Maybe I'm not as intellectually deep as other people or as sucessful as others, but at least I've lived it mostly on my own terms. It's not perfect. There have been many troubles along the way, but at least now I am at peace with myself. How is this going to last? I don't know, but I'm wiling to give it a fair chance.