I didn't think it could get worse . . .

but it did.

I've still not gotten any calls for interviews, and while I could still get a couple next week, with each day that goes by, I feel that much more discouraged. I guess the good thing is that I have gotten myself to the point where I don't really expect the phone to ring anymore. I'm extremely disappointed and frustrated, but I'm doing my best to accept that it happens. Some of the scholars I respect most in the profession didn't get jobs on their first tries either, so I guess that's not bad company to be in. . . it doesn't make the situation any easier to accept emotionally, but I'm trying not to be completely hopeless. There's a strange surreal quality to the whole thing though--it's like I'm living someone else's nightmare, except that it's really my life.

But what is worse is that today I was meeting with two friends who are also on the market to practice for interviews (which I wasn't all that jazzed about since I don't have any to practice for, but they do and they are my friends--well one is a better friend than the other. . .), so I put on a brave face and went hoping that it would boost my karma or something.

Boy did that backfire. In the middle of our practice session, someone else's phone rings (the girl I am friends with but don't know all that well). Not only did she get an interview, but it was for a job that I had also applied for. I don't begrudge her anything, and she's a very qualified applicant whose work is just very different from mine, but it *really* sucked to be in the room when that happened. I mean, it was one thing when my phone just wasn't ringing, and I knew on some abstract level that other people were getting calls, but this was so much worse. it made the whole dreadful experience all the more real. It was like getting punched in the stomach or just having the wind knocked right out of you. Kinda reminds me of those falls I tok a while back, but on a purely emotional level, if that makes sense.

On top of that, this particular friend is generally clueless so she then started talking about how she didn't think that she would really want the job all that much, but that she'd definitely interview with them, etc., and she's really glad that she's got more than one interview lined up now, blah, blah, blah. Now she didn't know that I had appplied for the job too, but she did know that I have a whopping ZERO interviews, so I wasn't really up for hearing her complain about the fact that she only had the one, because if I did get the one, I'd be pretty psyched. There's a huge difference between zero and one.

Thankfully, my other friend noticed that I had basically clammed up and was trying to make myself evaporate, so she asked if I was okay, and I managed to croak that I had applied for the same job . . . which made the other girl immediately start to say things like, "Well, maybe they'll call you too . . ." (unsurprsingly, they didn't). Part of me is really gald that she felt so terrible about it--it's not her fault, but her general insensitivity about the whole thing was really shocking to me. Maybe now she'll stop her complaining, at least when I'm around, because now I *really* don't want to hear it.

What I find so frustrating is that I know I could do a good job if someone would just give me a chance. The problem is that my project is rather iconclastic, so it doesn't fit into most of the conventional job categories. I know that the work is good, and I know that it makes an important contribution to my field . . . i just need to get in the damned room to convince other people.

But at least the suspense is over for the weekend.