Help Pirate keep his home

Edit: Thank you all so very much! I am floored by everyone's kindness and generosity. You have no idea how much this helps and how much stress has been lifted from my shoulders. At the suggestion of a friend, I have increased the goal so that if more people wish to help they still can. My initial need to cover rent, utilities and food for the next month has been met, so now I'm doubly focuses on finding work and studying to learn new skills for a new career. All additional funds will help keep my mind at ease while doing that, and will go towards future rent, utilities and food should work opportunities remain elusive.

Hey all, this is Pirate (from discord). Many will probably know me better as my in game names (of which I have many). Vryxnr, Shishio, Raamattu, Ullrezaj, Shurah, Lucca-1 (transferred from hardcore season 1), Rydia-1 (season 4), Nahzghoul, Alysvera the Healer, Funtimes-1 Helper Fairy (season 2), Aescalla, Desmodona, Eynid, Misaoh, Tomoyukishiro, Onosenshi... and several more but those are the characters I play the most. Aly and Lucca are in BBA, while Vryx is in LWoG. The rest of my alts are in my solo guild "The Ten Swords". Vryxnr used to be my raid tank, but he's currently working on past lives as a warlock so it'll be a while before he's tanking again.

I'm using my alias instead of my real name because most people know me by my aliases and not my real name. I'm also not comfortable with using my real name online. I don't even have social media (twitter, facebook, etc).

However, the reason for this is not game related at all. I've been hit rather hard by the pandemic lockdowns, and I'm still suffering. My income is virtually non-existent at the moment and my savings are running low. This is why I've been mostly MIA from the game the last year... I've been dealing with this. Alas, I may not be able to afford my bills this month and I'm getting desperate, and I'm now hoping to receive some help from others.

 

Background: I used to work in theatre, as in house staff at a university. Sadly, this is no longer the case. In fact, they treated the whole pandemic rather poorly and burned many bridges along the way. I was led on and lied to, told that my position was safe and that I'd be the first one contacted when any work would be able to be done. I even suggested things that would not really break the lockdowns, such as coming in by myself to do some maintenance on our equipment and instruments (I also have a music background as well, and my workplace had both a combination thrust and in-the-round theatre as well as a concert hall and recording studio with several 9' grand pianos and a custom built organ, just to name a few things, all of which risk damage if left untouched for long stretches of time). Little did I know until it was too late, that my "bosses" wanted to cut costs by being able to hire new people or re-hire me at lower pay once the lockdowns ended, and to do this they needed to keep me from working for 6 months, at which point a clause in our union agreement about work abandonment would kick in, causing my position to be terminated and all my seniority erased. And this is exactly what happened.

 

I didn't realize how much of my identity I had tied up with my work, so I was crushed and entered into a very long depression. To make matters worse, I was denied Employment Insurance because my former employer put in an incorrect address for me (my denial letter said it was because I no longer lived in the country, which is false). I know in retrospect I could have fought that and gotten the mistake fixed, but I was in such a bad mental state I... let's just say that I could not act reasonably or logically at the time.

 

I was able to get government aid because this was all caused by the pandemic, but that has now ended and I'm on my own again.

 

I have been applying for work. Any work. Theatre work is still shut down where I live, and will not fully open for a while still. However, I still have a bitter taste in my mouth and would be happy changing fields and dedicate myself to non-theatre work. Sadly, even entry level positions are ghosting me. The very few interviews I have gotten made it very clear that, because of my work history (over a decade of only highly specialized theatre work), no one wants to hire me. Even when I tell them I want to change careers and do non-theatre work, they still believe that I'd leave the moment things fully open again, making me not worth the time and effort to hire.

 

And this is where I'm at. I have resumes out, but almost no one replies, and the few that do reply have trouble getting over my past work history and never call back. My savings are almost completely drained, and I have bills to pay. I just moved into a cheaper rental unit, so my costs are lower, but I am still on the edge of losing everything and becoming homeless.

 

My listed goal would cover 1 months rent, utilities, and food. I'm really hoping I can find work so I will not have to ask for help beyond this month, but I do not know the future and cannot say what my situation will be. A friend has offered to help me learn software programming, but that takes several months... until that comes to fruition I'm still stuck worrying if I'll have a home or not.

Anything will help. Thank you very much for reading all of this and for your consideration.