Defend Your Territory – coming soon…

Soon to be released Debut Novel by Anthony Terence for all e-book readers and print on demand version available.

Defend Your Territory – Synopsis

2010, northern England is suffering from unemployment and socio-economic problems. Families are losing jobs, homes and spirit.

Oliver Brubeck, a single 40-year old jack-of-all-trades, is an ordinary man approaching a mid-life crisis, without much in fact to have a crisis about. Self-identity and how he is perceived becomes the crisis, only for him to discover that life and how you accept its challenges is in fact what defines you.

Family, friends, neighbours and bullish acquaintances put demands on Oliver but despite the adversity he is faced with—death, betrayal, loneliness and ailing youth, he finds solace in the humour and solidarity of the residents of Mammoth Avenue with whom he becomes attached and forever entwined.

Job applications: No joy

Revisiting an article I wrote 3 years ago for thesite.org for their Community, Real Life page. Sometimes you just have to get it all down on paper. Hopefully/Unfortunately I speak for a lot of people…

View the original article here

Job Applications: No joy

Filling out endless job applications is a pain says Anthony Waite. The least an employer can do is acknowledge them.

Today I have spent my time doing nothing but fill out application forms knowing the chances of an employer getting back to me are close to zero. It’s been weeks since I’ve even received acknowledgement of an application. The mind-numbing drudgery of it all is soul destroying. The more frustrated I get with it, the more mistakes I make.

If I make a mistake then there is no way to rectify it in a neat and subtle way. As the application form is the ‘passport to the interview’ any small error is costly. I’ve noticed that employers are increasingly asking for hand-written applications. A simple error such as writing in blue ink when asked to do it in black and my form will go straight into the rejection pile. It makes me wonder if they’re making this first hurdle in the process difficult in order to get rid of as many challengers as possible. I find the prospect of handwriting an application a nuisance when I could easily use the copy and paste function on the computer to fill in the basic information on different online forms. It feels like a ‘survival of the fittest’ – if I don’t adapt I won’t get to the next rounds. Sometimes I don’t even get to the end of an application form before I feel like I’m going to explode with frustration.

So why are applications such a nightmare? Well, the job market currently so awful that for even the most basic of clerical jobs I have dozens, if not hundreds, of competitors. I’m applying for jobs that I don’t really want but that I need. The government doesn’t help by threatening sanctions for people who turn down any job offer. I could end up as part of a nation who is working in a job they hate. The section on forms I find the most frustrating is the one that asks how you meet the criteria on the job specification. I could probably do the job in question but it’s about ‘selling myself’ and exaggerating my experience to hopefully put myself at the top of the short list. So I end up economising the truth for a job that I don’t want in the first place. Not exactly motivational.

“I end up economising the truth for a job that I don’t want in the first place. Not exactly motivational.”

I can therefore understand why employers may not rejoice in plunging through the pile of applications that land on their desk. It must be time-consuming and frustrating. But, despite this, it would be nice if they considered me, the unemployed person who’s spent a long time on their form. It should be mandatory to respond to a submission even if it’s a quick email to say, ‘sorry, but good luck’ or give me a pointer on how to improve my chances. The feeling of limbo is worse than knowing that it’s a no.

At first, being unemployed felt like a disease that I didn’t want people to know I had. But then I realised that there were lots of people (a lot more experienced as well) who were in the same position. Still that doesn’t make it any easier when all your friends and acquaintances kindly ask how the job-hunting is going. Thanks for asking but I really don’t want to talk about it. I spend enough of my day trawling through web sites and newspapers looking for anything half decent to apply for, so that by evening I may be able to relax and not think about it.

So, how can employers be more responsive to my efforts? A simple solution is to send a generic email letting me know the outcome of my application. With the knowledge I would at least get a response, I’d be more willing to take extra care and effort completing an application form because I’ll know it will at least been read. It would give me a more positive approach to job applications. But, as this is unlikely, the next best option would be for me to frequently contact the employer asking for an outcome – then they might take note of my predicament and change the way that they respond to applications.

The Search

I wrote this on a blustery January afternoon while I was at university. I had burned myself out with revision so started writing random things down. Turns out I should have been in an exam at that moment. Oops!

“For every man that’s losing his race
Take the rag away from your face
Loyalty now will only spur on disgrace
For a rotten, local, hapless case

No one will account for another blunder
The silence be misplaced by a roll of thunder
Leaves two there with trust to plunder
Why some can’t drag ‘emselves from under

Now tomorrow brings but another play
To test the characters role and say,
“I dunno, I was just made this way
So I’ll just script myself the perfect day”

MUSINGS

I wrote this when I was feeling a bit lost, wanting to change things but feeling incapable. Searching for freedom but finding nothing but chains…

So,

all of the little spiders have been replaced by one large spider. Not very pleasant. Usually when you are not expecting something to happen it goes alright but this time I have to admit it was a shock. I guess something is biting back for lack of toleration of species. It’s not as clear as (“No beans, no jacket potato, no bath”) it seems it seems because I wasn’t that affected by it at all. The only craving appears to be for freedom which is so near but protected by a force field so hard to disconnect from whatever it is that creates it. There’s not much to go back to really. Although in reality that is most likely a blatant lie since I’ve done everything since I’ve got back. Not a second to spare. It often reflects meaningless until you realise that there is no escape to the muse that you crave because everything is not going against you or for you. You’re stuck in an expanse of devilish work that corrupts the mind of obedience and the realisation that not everything is possible because there are certain controls that cannot be tampered with. You can often try, but after a while it becomes uncomfortable and you are set back into your old ways. Not for the best but for the more realistic. There is not enough power that can be created to change something as big as that. I’m sure it takes months, if not years to attain some kind of revolution within oneself by oneself. There is no-one or no thing that can influence you although you can allow it to transform into a different meaning that can influence you. You just have to see it from another point of view. Whose view it is, I’m not sure but at least you are thinking outside of the box and not becoming stuck in some rigid state where you are shocked that everything is moving at a slower pace than you thought imaginable. It often comes down to decisions. And boy do I have some to make.

They may not be important but they don’t even appear to resemble anything to others. They have no idea about it. That’s the interesting thing. You can go on and on and on and on and on and you are still alluded to the people that you least want to be alluded to. It’s not funny how that works. It’s a bit disturbing. You can give 100% and feel that on the other side the increase in miniscule: 0.00000000000001. But you can’t change that. It’s not up to you. I don’t know who it’s up to but I know that it can be done. I have read things that confirm that and their basis for truth is unparalleled with what others may conceive. (“Sounds like it”) Taking that 497th step may seem easy but when you realise how many steps you’ve taken but when you look how many there are to go it’s another slap in the feet.

Surprise #2, now it’s even worse. It was the best one you could have though. Well there’s three days now anyway. We’ll see.

DUST

Having a nostalgic moment remembering the important innocent times of childhood. I can still feel it, smell it and taste it.

Summer supplies the hearts of the children
in the playground with extra vigour.
The shorts finally seem to make sense.
Sweaters for goalposts, arms for guns, the railing as the den,
Girls with flimsy chains: he loves me, he loves me not

Just then, the wind whips up and throws all fun into oblivion
as the dust gathers and gusts across the yard,
the devil performing his mischievous plan.
Murmers form shrieks into mass panic
as the world holds still for a thousandth of an hour.

A barren desert created to oppose the
Rich green architecture of seconds before.
The weeps become apparent as an echo from the children
Who attempt to envisage their world again,
Although,
It will never be the same.

Can anyone remember whether the ball was in,
if someone was supposed to have been shot,
if someone was caught out before the promised land?

All that’s important is forgotten as the wounded return to their feet,
And the mass graves return to life.

The kibbnaper

In truth, I don’t think you get anything more honest than this attempt at a story, written aged 7, retyped verbatim.

once upon a time a boy called mark was walking home from School. A feu hous later his mum was wurrieyd becouse he wasent back yet So she went down to his School and asked his teacher if he was Still there. But she said no He’s Been Kibbnapt… Iill phone the Police the police Said whats his sere name so she said Terry berry. She cryed and cryed and the houl place flooded. Marcks freand were playing football with Luke Shaun and Anthony with Mr Bowevier. They had just finished when the ball hit lukes head and fell over bleeding. The others screams when Luke fell over with a thump. Then they stared to sink and then tenage mutin turlels flue up into heaven. Marks mum stared singing Glory………..ry in ee—chel-sea—dayO She sang to much and she blow up in to out of space and hit Jupetr and wized past heaven and blow erey one up becuse she sang to loud and every body lived in hopital the end