During my time in Longwood, I have not developed any professional relations with anyone, because at the time of this portfolio’s creation, I was a freshman. However, over the summer, I have obtained employment with Walmart, and stayed with them for 3 months before I took a leave of absence for college again. This is my only instance of professional experience in the workplace — so far, they like how I work, and I’ve learned a lot from working as a cashier.
It was difficult to socialize before this job, but during my time at Longwood last year and during this most recent summer, I’ve improved substantially in my communication skills. I now speak clearer and only what I intend to convey; I’m better at not looking like I want to kill somebody. (I had a bad case of angry face for a while, so I hope I look calmer now!)
That is what this job has allowed me to learn, and I plan to stay with them for as long as I’m able to, before my next job (hopefully something within my career choice.) When I go for some type of internship or take professional commissions with GAND, I will update this artifact to elaborate!
End of 2019, through to 2020
In between working on school projects and studying for my classes, both last summer of 2019 and this current summer of 2020 have been times where I’ve been working as a Wal-mart associate. This job has been helping me understand social cues better, knowing how much small talk is too much small talk, understanding and following the requests of my managers, etc. What stuck with me particularly, recently, was a very busy night we had during this pandemic, and we had a lot of people coming in for groceries. We close now at 8:30 pm, and at around 8 pm, at least 30 people decided to come in for some last-minute shopping.
“Do you feel like staying til 8:30?” one of my managers asked me. And at first I said no, but then I saw all those people, and I figured, “No, they’re going to need me in there. They’ll only have one or two cashiers ready to get people out the door.” So, I stayed, and once everything was said and done, one of my coworkers said, “That was really nice. You didn’t have to do that, you know.”
So, it stuck with me. I could tell she appreciated the help, and my managers felt the same. I may just be a single number in this huge, nationwide system, but in this one store, I made an impact for one night.
I hope I get some more chances to do that. I know how much it sucks to not have help to sift through the hundreds of customers we get in only one half hour. If I can make life easier for my coworkers, even for just a little while, then that makes all the difference to me.
2020-2021
With every year that passes by, I get more and more anxious about where I’m going to go next. This marks my third year, and the first year I have started taking medications for Bipolar II Disorder and ADHD-Inattentive type. The reason why I mention these is because they dramatically affect how I work, function in everyday life, and how I feel about myself.
This year has been a journey for me. I reconnected with my biological mother, I learned more about how my brain works, and for the first time in my life, working on school and at work feels easier. Not easy, but easier. Things are more manageable. With this journey started, I hope that it will be even easier than this. I hope that I can begin pursuing proper animation projects, and my senior thesis project (bunny/golem video game) will be a good way to break into the industry. If not, I don’t mind. I still work at Walmart, same as usual, and I will continue to grind away until I can make the time to do what I want to do.
I wish I had looked at internships sooner. I always did, and then I talked myself out of it, because I keep thinking, “I don’t know nearly enough about any of these programs or techniques to hold my own in such a competitive area.” Somehow the internships are more competitive than the workplace itself. Maybe I’ll do just fine without one, though. With every shot I don’t take, I miss, but I am working up into a place where I feel comfortable enough to take risks.
For now, all I want to do is enjoy this very brief period of stability, and calm. It’s the calm before the storm, and soon enough, I’ll be applying for jobs in animation and storyboarding, maybe even video game development. We shall see.