Tag Archives: work

August 26, 2015 · 11:15 PM

Daymares

image002

Within the same week a few months ago my parents had nightmares about their former jobs. It’s unsettling because they’ve both been retired for a while. My mother worked in the insurance business for nearly 51 years before retiring in 2003 at age 70. My father worked for two different printing shops; starting when he was 17. He got laid off in 1994 from the last one. They’re old school; in their day, you went to work for a company and stayed there for decades. Thus, I’ve had some trouble explaining my career as a freelance technical writer to them. They each worked roughly the same number of years I’ve now been alive.

But why, after all these years, they have occasional bad dreams about work is beyond my comprehension. I suppose they gave so much of their time and energy to those places that it’s dug an emotional trench in their respective souls like a gunshot wound.

I’ve only had three dreams about work. The first occurred in the late 1980s, when I worked for a retail store. I was being harassed by a manager who already had a nasty reputation. Strangely, though, (and what dream isn’t strange?) my parents were at the store with me. They knew I’d been having a tough time with that asshole of a manager and had come to help me out. When he shouted at them, I lost my temper and screamed at him. My own yelling woke me up. Not long afterwards, that manager was transferred to another store. I guess someone in the company’s echelons of power heard me yelling.

The other two dreams came within months of losing my job at an engineering firm in the fall of 2010. I had been so stressed out there in the last few months it was almost a relief to get laid off. It even cost me a back tooth. Just a few weeks earlier I had begun experiencing pain on the left side of my mouth. I didn’t know what to think when I realized that tooth was loose. Neither did my dentist. But, by the time I visited him, I knew my job was the crux of the agony.

“You have two choices,” he told me. “I can pull it or try to do a root canal.”

“Pull the bitch,” I calmly told him, thinking of my then-supervisor and then-manager. As he wrangled it from my jaw, I tried to think of ways to make it look like that supervisor and that manager had freak accidents. At work. On the same day. With no one else around.

Stress does that to a person – especially work-related stress. It makes them physically ill and emotionally drained. At various times during my eleven years working for a large bank, I felt the impact of job-induced stress. Back aches and short bursts of rage were the most common for me. Back then, though, I was able to fight it off because of my strict exercise regimen: pushups and crunch sit-ups in the morning; weight-lifting; jogging; and taekwondo. In one martial arts session, I almost beat the crap out of a close friend. We were fully padded up, so neither of us felt much. But he told me afterwards that I literally scared him. I apologized, but he just laughed. I explained to him what was happening to me at the bank, and he understood. Still, at that moment, I felt angry enough to send Chuck Norris screaming from the room. Despite my tenure at the bank and all the crap I endured, I never once dreamed of the place.

So, it’s still a mystery why I let my eight-year stint at the engineering company affect me in the nocturnal hours.

In the first dream, I was at corporate headquarters in Southern California with my former project manager, Dagwood*, who had hired me in 2002. He was a quirky character who’d joined the company right out of college. But I liked him and stood up for him, whenever I felt another associate was disrespecting him. In the dream, the building sat right along the coastline, separated from the water only by a strip of sand and a road. Dagwood had been there many times, but this was my first visit. And everyone was on edge. A major quake had pummeled the seabed a few miles offshore, and local officials anticipated an equally massive tsunami. The coastal areas had already been evacuated, and building management had informed us they were monitoring the situation closely. When the first wave approached, they’d sound the alarms, and everyone on the lower levels would flee upwards, which in real tsunami reactions, is known as vertical evacuation.

I’ve always been fascinated by the more extreme elements of the natural world and recall being fascinated with the prospect of witnessing a tsunami up close. But I was also frightened, since I’d never been through something like that. Dagwood had, though; a similar incident had occurred a few years earlier, he told me, before I started with the company. A massive seaquake had struck, and a tsunami was expected. But it was almost a false alarm; the tsunami waves turned out to be merely inches. This time, however, officials anticipated a real disaster.

“Don’t worry,” Dagwood reassured me. “Just stay with me, and you’ll be alright. When those alarms go off, we’ll just head upstairs.”

Cool, I thought. I felt better.

Then, as I labored over my laptop, seated right beside a window overlooking the beachfront, the alarms went off. I heard a loud thundering sound and looked out the window to see the first monstrous wall of water rushing towards us. I panicked, as I leapt to my feet and began looking for Dagwood. He was nowhere. Some people started screaming in fear, as others headed towards the stairwell. Where was Dagwood? I kept asking. He’s supposed to be here. Good God! Did he just abandon me?

I ran from one office to another, searching for him, thinking surely he wouldn’t be so cruel towards me. Several other people were also scrambling around; consumed more with hysteria. But I still couldn’t find Dagwood. Finally, I just stopped and, as the sound of the encroaching tsunami drowned out every other noise, I turned to the ceiling and said, “Fuck him.”

I proceeded towards a stairwell, and – amazingly – everyone else stopped screaming and followed me up the stairs. We all made it safely and could only watch as the water rumbled over the sand and the road, before tearing into the building’s ground floor.

But I kept asking myself that question over and over: where was Dagwood? He was nowhere to be found. What had been trepidation just moments earlier turned to anger. He really did abandon me.

I woke up.

In the second dream, I was back in downtown Dallas, at the government agency where I’d worked most of the time I was with the company. We had an important meeting; one where we’d learn our fate under the new contract. I simply couldn’t be late. As the meeting time approached, I was trying desperately to finish a critical task. I finally tore myself from my computer and headed towards a nearby meeting room. No one was there. I darted to another conference room. It, too, was empty. Where is everyone? Where is this damn meeting being held? I can’t be late!

I began scampering about the building; running into every conference room I could find. They were either empty or occupied by someone else. But, by then, I’d realized something even more disconcerting: I was stark naked. At some point, my clothes had come off. That usually happens only to porn stars and politicians, not to technical writers. And not in a government building! No one seemed to care, though, and I was only slightly bothered by it. I was more concerned with finding out where that damn meeting was being held. I finally gave up and sauntered into the break room. I dropped into a chair, still butt-naked, and resigned myself to an uncertain fate.

I woke up.

Both dreams are rife with symbolism. I know what they mean to me, but you can make your own inferences. Yet, once I recovered from that second dream, I vowed never to dream about work again. It wasn’t worth the aggravation. No job is. After years of dealing with bully bosses, hostile coworkers, office gossip, impossible deadlines and paltry raises, I want to occupy my mind with something far more significant and meaningful than a fucking job.

And it’s worked. I haven’t dreamed about the engineering company again. I told my parents they need to let go of their old jobs. “That was years ago,” I said. Those places shouldn’t hold such a strong grip on their minds.

We spend so much of our lives at work, or doing something work-related, and we don’t always get something positive after expending all that time and energy. People, especially men, have often defined themselves by what type of career they had. Blue collar, white collar, no collar. Whatever they did to make a living is who they were. One of the first questions people ask when they meet someone for the first time is, “What do you do?” And, of course, they don’t really mean, ‘What do you do in your spare time?’ Or, ‘What do you do every third Saturday of the month?’ They mean, ‘How do you make yourself a valuable part of your community?’

But I know people are generally worth more than the way they earn money. I define myself as a writer; always have and always will. So I proudly tell people I’m a technical writer. That’s how I currently earn my living. Eventually, I hope to make a living from my creative writing. Regardless, I know for damn sure that slaving over a hot keyboard is not all that I am. And whatever type of job or career you have, dear readers, should not be all who you are. We’re worth a hell of a lot more than that.

And, next time I’m on the west coast, I may see a real live tsunami, but I won’t be thinking of Dagwood.

*Name changed.

3 Comments

Filed under Essays

Tagged as , , , , , ,

September 1, 2014 · 10:39 PM

Laborious

Finally – some good news!

Finally – some good news!

A few years ago – about a year after I got laid off from an engineering company and while I struggled to find even a temporary job while trying to launch my freelance writing career – I told a close friend of mine via email that, when the economy improves, people will start switching jobs without giving much, if any, notice to their employers.

“True,” he replied.

It’s starting to happen. The recent economic crisis – the worst in this nation’s history since the Great Depression – almost completely destroyed our financial stability. Multiple factors were responsible for it: broad-based tax cuts for the wealthiest citizens and largest corporations; further deregulation of banking and housing; and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Between December 2007 (when the recession officially commenced) and June 2009 (when it officially ended), the U.S. economy shed roughly 8.7 million jobs. Employers began to add jobs in 2010. Only recently, however, have we regained all those lost jobs.

There’s no real cause for celebration. The after effects of such a prolonged economic debacle are as varied as the causes. People lost accumulated personal wealth; state and local economies suffered decreased tax revenue; and home values dropped. Wages, however, remain stagnant, despite increased productivity. People have always worked too damn hard for their money. Of course, everyone feels they’re overworked and underpaid. But now, we have statistical proof. But, according to Ben Bernanke, chairman of the U.S. Federal Reserve System, the “Great Recession” actually was worse than the Great Depression. In a statement filed on August 22 with the U.S. Court of Federal Claims, as part of a response to a lawsuit over the 2008 bailout of insurance giant American International Group (AIG), Bernanke said:

“September and October of 2008 was the worst financial crisis in global history, including the Great Depression.” Of the 13 “most important financial institutions in the United States, 12 were at risk of failure within a period of a week or two.”

When asked why he thought it was critical for the U.S. government to rescue AIG, Bernanke replied:

“AIG’s demise would be a catastrophe” and “could have resulted in a 1930s-style global financial and economic meltdown, with catastrophic implications for production, income, and jobs.”

Obviously, too-big-to-fail truly has become too big to fail! The Great Depression was exacerbated by the fact the Federal Reserve System didn’t take command of the banks. Billionaire financier Andrew Mellon was the U.S. Treasury Secretary during the Hoover Administration and – like a typical conservative Republican – believed the nation’s banks had gotten themselves into trouble and needed to get themselves out of it, even if that meant they failed and took their customers’ money with them. Which they did, of course, in very large numbers. At the time, though, we didn’t have a Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) to safeguard people’s financial assets. The federal government’s lackadaisical attitude at the onset of the Great Depression forced Republicans to lose both houses of Congress during the 1930 midterm elections and shoved Hoover out of the White House two years later. That same kind of ineptitude is probably what caused them to lose both houses of Congress in 2006.

Yet, as the economy continues to recover and employers continue adding jobs, I see my aforementioned prediction materializing. During sluggish markets, employers can afford to be picky on who they hire and can freeze wages and salaries at will. It’s almost cruel and inhumane the way some can behave. And, what’s the average worker to do? With children, mortgages, car payments and other debts, they’re often stuck. They have little power.

But, from January to June of this year, more than 14 million people quit their jobs. I would like to think they left for better jobs. And, I’d like to believe they gave little notice to their employers. After all, companies don’t have to give employees any real notice when they plan to let someone go; albeit, quite often, people can feel it. In 2009, there were approximately seven people for every job opening. As of June 2014, the ratio had dropped to 2-to-1. Overall, the number of unemployed has dropped by 5 million, while the number of new jobs has grown by 2.5 million. Now, there’s talk of a problem we haven’t seen in a while: labor shortage. Companies are starting to feel one of the adverse effects of an improving economy; there aren’t enough people, or at least not enough qualified people, to fill certain positions. Thus, it’s employees and jobseekers who can be picky.

And, that’s a good thing. It’s really the way it should be. Only once in my life have I had the pleasure of quitting a job I hate; in January 1989, I left a retail position, which I’d held for nearly three years. I just walked into the place and gave my immediate supervisor a typewritten note announcing my resignation. But, I’ve known a few people who, in recent years, essentially gave their boss the middle finger and walked out of a company. They recounted their experiences with glee. We spend a great deal of time at work; often more than with our own families. Work gives people personal value and a sense of accomplishment, and everyone who makes an effort to complete a job should be respected. Whether that person answers the phones in a call center; digs ditches for sewer lines; programs a voice mail system; or rings up items at a cash register, they should be considered important. They pay taxes and insurance and they put the rest of their money back into the economy as consumers.

Last week, an executive in the company where I’m working as a contract technical writer staged an impromptu meeting to announce a major organizational change. After presenting a variety of business details, he said something that I’d never heard from someone at his level: “Family is more important than work.” He emphasized that everyone needs to place greater value on their loved ones than on their careers; noting that he hadn’t done that and almost paid the price for it. I’ve heard some executives tell people on an individual basis the same thing – but never in such a large setting. He’s right. A company won’t collapse because you can’t make it to a business conference. You won’t necessarily recall that training seminar. But, you most likely will remember a child’s sports event. And, you’ll cherish it forever.

3 Comments

Filed under Essays

Tagged as , , , , , ,

May 1, 2014 · 11:11 PM

My Time in a Locked Box

cubicles_15

Up until mid-March, I had a temporary position at a lock-box facility with a major financial institution. I won’t name the company or the staffing firm that found me the job, but I will emphasize that it was one of the worst places I’ve ever worked. I took the position as a filler job amidst my freelance writing gigs. In a way, I’m glad I did, though, because it gave me a clearer view of just how bad things are in the U.S. right now. If our elected officials could experience such drudgery, matters would change in no time.

A lock-box is an intermediary between a company and the bank that handles their accounts. You might notice a post office box listed as the mailing address on bills for telephone and water utilities. That box number simply steers the payments to a separate facility where they’re processed on behalf of the bank. It’s beneficial for the bank from a time efficiency standpoint. But, they’re also breeding grounds for fraud. The workers – many of them contract or temporary – handle countless personal checks and documents with sensitive information that can then be purloined or photocopied.

The place where I worked handles immigration applications on behalf of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. My specific job was to analyze packets of applications and ensure they contained the proper documentation. Security procedures are tight. Every employee – even temporaries – must wear a slave tag, or what they call “badges.” The badge bears the individual’s picture; tiny image that make driver’s license photos look like glamour shots. The badges also have digital codes that would trigger doors to open. To enter the actual location where the documentation was handled, associates had to swipe their badges and then apply an index fingertip to a scanner beneath the electronic locks. For some reason, the lock always had trouble identifying my fingertip. No, I wasn’t using my middle finger – although seems more appropriate now. But, I’d often stand in front of that stupid lock pressing my finger down like a rogue political leader reaching for a nuke button.

The job was monotonous and dull. I get bored easily anyway, so it was difficult for me to stay interested. But, I noticed a number of things. Most of the associates were female and / or non-White. Yet, the bulk of the supervisors and managers were composed of the usual suspects: older White males. None of that really surprised me. Women, non-Whites, the disabled and immigrants now hold the bulk of temporary and part-time jobs in the U.S. These groups have always resided at the lower rungs of the American work force. But, the 2007 – 08 financial crisis intensified those numbers. But, gender and race only tell part of the story.

Between 2007 and 2009, the American labor force lost 8.4 million jobs, or 6.1% of all employment. Since then, most of the newly-created jobs have been temporary or contract. Last year the U.S. added 2.8 million temporary or contract employees to the national payroll. After the previous two recessions, American companies increased employment by adding temporary workers. In fact, an increase in temporary and contract work generally signifies overall economic improvement. But, this recession is something new; most of the good-paying jobs that delineated the American middle class have been replaced with low-wage positions. Temporary jobs aren’t a sign of better times ahead; they’re a sign of the new (pathetically, dismal) normal.

In early 1990, I had a temporary position at a lock-box facility in Dallas. Back then, as now, the bulk of the workforce was female and non-White, while most of the managers and supervisors were White males. My immediate supervisor, however, was a Panamanian-born woman who once made an employee remove 37 seconds from her time card because she said the latter had been late that much when returning from break. Her manager was an older White male who had a quirky Napoleonic complex, but whom I liked much better. He didn’t work well under pressure; something that made observing him the highlight of the day. But, that was almost a quarter-century ago. And, from a workforce standpoint, not much has changed.

When I told my parents the paltry pay rate I earned at this last job, they were shocked. It was the same amount my father had earned as a contract employee of a printing shop in the early 1990s. He had worked for the company for nearly 30 years before he got laid off in 1989; he was then, rehired as a contractor.

The issue of salaries and pay rates has been staring the slow economic recovery square in its ugly face. Mid-wage jobs – those averaging between $13 and $22 hourly –made up about 60% of the jobs lost during the recession. But, those same mid-wage jobs comprised about 27% of the jobs created since 2010. However, lower-paying jobs have dominated the job recovery – roughly 58%. Nearly 40%, or 1.7 million of the jobs gained during the recovery, are in three of the lowest-paying categories: food services, retail and employment services (e.g. office clerks, customer service representatives). All of this has not only decimated the American middle class, but has pushed the U.S. below Canada regarding middle class affluence.

stateofworkingamerica.org

Graph courtesy U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

A few other things bothered me about the facility where I worked. Because of the number of documents that arrive on a daily basis, the amount of paper is overwhelming. Should a fire break out, I thought, it could be catastrophic – and mainly because of one simple device: cell phones. People aren’t allowed to bring cell phones into the main production area. The reason is obvious: most cell phones now have camera features, and it would be easy for someone to snap a picture of classified documents. Therefore, anyone who enters the production area has to leave their cell phone in their vehicle, in a designated locker in the same building, or with security. But, along with the odd juxtaposition of desks, I also noticed fire exits weren’t clearly marked. People would be safe in the building should a tornado descend upon the property. But, if a fire erupted, I’m certain many people would head towards their lockers to grab their cell phones. Such a scenario reminds me of the 1911 Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire in which 146 people (mostly women and immigrants) perished.

I arrived home from work one Friday to find a voice mail message on my cell phone from the staffing agency, telling me to call them immediately. The lock-box firm had pulled the job from me. The unit manager had accused me of being consistently late. His idea of “late” apparently is one or two minutes past the hour. I pointed that out to the staffing agency; emphasizing, though, that I made up the one, two or three minutes I arrived late. Moreover, I said, I’d already attained a 100% accuracy rate on the job. None of that seemed to matter. The agency was in a bind; they couldn’t refute whatever chicken-shit opinion the manager had of me.

It’s no great personal loss. I won’t exactly be seeking therapy because of it. Some things just aren’t worth the trouble. As this May Day comes to a close, it’s important to remember that people usually work too damn hard for their money. As the wealth gap in the U.S. widens, I don’t know how much longer this, or any truly democratic society, can deem itself civilized.

Image courtesy Compare Business Products.

3 Comments

Filed under Essays

Tagged as , , , ,

May 1, 2014 · 12:11 AM

Happy May Day 2014!

mayday-green

“True individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. People who are hungry and out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made.”

– Franklin D. Roosevelt

 

May Day.

Image courtesy Lucyria.

1 Comment

Filed under News

Tagged as , , , , ,

December 20, 2012 · 11:13 PM

Update: Third Time’s A…Whatever!

Statue_of_the_Tired_Man

Sometimes I think the umbilical cord got tied around my neck when I was born and I ended up deprived of oxygen for the first few seconds of life; not enough to kill me, but enough to kill off a handful of brain cells.  Brain cells that never had a chance to grow into fully functioning emblems of life.  The job I thought I had turned out to be a bust.  I hate to sound like a victim, but the health care company where I was supposed to go to work needs a thorough proctological exam.  Its corporate head is jammed up its corporate ass.  Then again, what company doesn’t suffer from that affliction?  Especially the health care ones!

I was really surprised to get that job in the first place.  My interview was set for a Friday at 8 A.M., and I was late because I got lost.  MapQuest didn’t lead me in the right direction.  Didn’t they have problems with the Grand Canyon being put somewhere like Detroit or something a while back?  Either way, it just proves you can’t rely on technology too much.  In the old days – circa 1990 when I first went to work at the bank – you had to call the place and get actual cross street names and stuff.  Either way, I arrived 20 minutes late and made the best of it.  I looked at the lady in the eye and asked plenty of questions about the company itself.  I’d done my research on it; even finding out their latest stock price from the day before.  That kind of detail usually impresses people, or terrifies them if you’re with the Secret Service and trying to nab someone selling faux Cabbage Patch dolls.  But, I forgot about it after I left; thinking that the 20 minutes late thing killed it for me.  I returned home and went to bed.  I was still sleepy.  Thank God my truck knows its way back to the house.

Then, the recruiter with the health care staffing agency who had contacted me almost a month earlier called me late Monday afternoon.  The company offered me the position!  I couldn’t believe it.  I’d been late to an interview two previous times and didn’t get the job.  So, I was surprised.  Not enough to have an orgasm, but enough to have a drink that evening.  I had to complete the requisite paper work and submit to a drug screening and criminal background check.  I hate drug screening tests!  Can’t they just draw blood these days, instead of requiring you to urinate into a tiny plastic cup and then hand it back to them, like you’re a bartender at a dive joint?  I guess blood makes some people too squeamish.  The criminal background check is always intriguing.  I never know if they see my Spanish surname and feel compelled to contact the Border Patrol.  Damn those illegals!  But apparently, a weekend of drinking only water and shredding important documents paid off.  I was scheduled to start this past Monday, the 17th.  What could go wrong now?

A lot.

I had asked the recruiter (who’s in Florida) to whom was I supposed to report at the company.  She didn’t have a name; just go to the receptionist’s desk, and someone will lead me to orientation.  Okay, good.  Orientation was set for 9 A.M., and I arrived at 8:35.  I signed in at the receptionist’s desk log book and waited.  And waited.  And waited.  And waited.  For about 10 minutes.  A couple of people came and went.  No one stopped to ask if they could help me; offer me a bottle of water; compliment me on my suit.  They just strolled past as if I was another cheap Christmas ornament.

Finally, the receptionist glided into the office in her 5-inch spike heels.  I told her who I was and why I was there.  She initially looked at me as if I was from the sewer plant; then she told me to head back down to the lobby and “wait on one of those black couches.”

“Any particular couch?”

“No, just pick one.  And, I’ll call someone to come get you.”

Okay, good.

So, I loped back down to the first level of the spacious glass-lined lobby and waited on one of the black couches.  And waited.  And waited.  And waited.  Until I needed to find a men’s room.  After I stalked the halls of the first level, looking for the men’s room – hoping a ninja security official wouldn’t zap me with a taser for looking suspicious in my black suit and black brief case – I returned to that same black-ass couch.  And waited.  And waited.

Then, I noticed a sign on an easel opposite from me, beside a set of glass double doors.  In faint, italic type it said: Orientation.  Ah-hah!  I found it!  I grabbed the door handles.  They wouldn’t open; it was a secured access area.  Like Fort Knox.  That ninja security was surely headed my way now.  I’d better retreat to the black couch on the other side of room.  Another side embedded in the wall next to the doors advised visitors to head to the receptionist desk on the second level.  I’m not a visitor!  I’m a new employee!

I called the recruiter.  She muttered a ‘hm.’  Not one of those, ‘that’s an interesting question,’ or a, ‘I’ve never thought of that,’ kind of ‘hm.’  It was one of those, ‘Oh, shit!  I don’t know what the hell to do,’ kind of hm.

“I’ll call you back,” she told me.

Please do.  When you get a chance.  I was starting to like hanging around that lobby, examining all the cheap artwork, and hoped I could savor it a little while longer.  “I’ll go back up to the receptionist desk,” I told her.  Perhaps, when I was in search of the men’s room, some tired human resources drone lumbered out of her cocoon looking for me and only found my butt print on that black couch.  I think he was here!  He had to have been right here!

The receptionists gave me that, ‘Oh, you again,’ look.  Her feet are still recovering from walking around in those 5-inch spike heels, I thought.  She started calling people; five different people.  I counted.  I hoped one of them wouldn’t be a ninja security official.  She went off on the last person: “Why didn’t I know about this?  Why doesn’t this trickle down?”

“I’m going to call my recruiter again,” I told her.  I wanted to tell Trickle-down she looked cute, even though she didn’t.  But, I decided it’s not worth the energy to kiss up to people anymore.  I retreated back to that one black couch where my butt print had faded.  I hoped I wouldn’t inadvertently make it reappear.  I decided to stand, chic black cell phone in hand, looking like I was waiting for a client.  I can do that very well.  I waited.  And waited.  And waited.

I’d heard the receptionist utter the name of someone; a lady in human resources I suspected.  Perhaps a life line into Fort Knox.  If I could find her, I’d be free from the glass lobby.  So I stopped a young woman exiting Fort Knox and asked if she knew this person.

“No,” she squeaked, before ambling away in her 4-inch spike heels.  What’s with these damn spike heels?!  I thought they’d gone the way of dial phones.

I asked another young woman exiting Fort Knox if she knew that particular woman.

“No,” she replied, before shuffling away in her painted-on jeans.  I thought painted-on jeans had also gone the way of spike heels.  They look so…so 70s-ish anyway.  Especially on a fat chick.

I stopped another woman leaving Fort Knox and asked if she could let me into the area.  I was prepared to tell her she looked cute, even though she didn’t.

“You have to check in at the receptionist desk,” she said.

“Okay,” I said with a gritty smile, “thank you.”  Translation: I’ve already done that you dumb bitch!  Let me into fucking Fort Knox!

I returned to the couch, cell phone in hand, keeping an eye out for that ninja security official.  I could see my big black truck from that vantage point.  It seemed to be calling for me.  ‘I’ll take you home now!  Just say the word and we’re gone.’

Then, that dreaded ninja security official arrived.  By my truck.  She stepped out of her little car with the yellow light on top and began examining my truck.  My truck can take care of itself; it’s a Dodge after all.  It scares Smart Cars stupid.  But, I decided I needed to help it out anyway.  The security official had whipped out her little note pad and was scribbling down my license plate number.  Didn’t note pads go the way of painted-on jeans?  I looked at her; this poor pathetic 50-something soul.  She was either a virgin or a lesbian; a girl whose role as a parking lot security official or a gym teacher was set at birth.

“I’m a new associate,” I told her.  Translation: I’m supposed to be here, so get the fuck away from my truck!

She squinted at me through her sunglasses.

“Apparently, there’s been a miscommunication,” I told her.

“Okay,” she said politely.  She had a nice smile – for a lesbian / virgin.

I arrived back home, much to my dog’s delight, and immediately emailed my recruiter to explain the situation.  ‘There’s been some kind of misunderstanding,’ I gleefully typed.  Translation: somebody fucked up big time!  I don’t know who it was; you or the company.  But, one of you two – maybe both of you – doesn’t have your shit together!

I breathed deep.

She called me and uttered that nefarious ‘hm.’  “Let me find out what’s going and call you back.”

Okay, good.  That would help to know what’s going on.  Problems get solved that way.

She called me back a few minutes later and told me to return to the company for the second half of orientation.  She even gave me the name and phone number of someone.  Perfect!

As I headed back, my phone rang.  It was a young woman I’ll call Andrea; she was with the company’s HR.  “I’m sorry,” she sang.  “There’s been some kind of mix-up.”

“Oh, I understand.  Those things happen.”  Translation: you have to be kidding me?!

She told me to wait for her in the lobby of that same building.

So, I arrived and perched myself in front of that same black couch; attired this time in a burgundy shirt and black slacks.  I still had my chic black cell phone and black brief case; still trying to look like a traditional well-seasoned businessman waiting for a client.  I waited.  And waited.  And waited.  And waited.  I finally decided to call that number the recruiter gave me.  It was the receptionist; the nothing-trickles-down-to-me gal whose feet hurt from walking around in those 5-inch spike heels.  She didn’t know why I was calling her, but said she’d call someone in HR to come get me.  Okay, good.  Don’t rush though.  I’m really enjoying this art work.

A moment later a young woman wandered into the lobby.  Andrea.  “I’m sorry,” she sang.  She was my saving grace; she knew who I was and why I was there – even if she resided in another building across the street.  She immediately began calling people from her hot pink cell phone.  She called three.  I counted.  No one knew what she did – that I’m a technical writer who was supposed to start that day.  For some reason, though, she couldn’t let me into Fort Knox.  “Let’s go upstairs!” she said cheerfully.

Oh sure!  Want to hang out near those cool fake Christmas trees and see Trickle-down again.

Trickle-down was not happy to see us.  She also didn’t know Singing Andrea.  They began calling more people.  They got one woman in there who tried to help.  I mean, she really tried.  But, she didn’t know where I was supposed to go.  I couldn’t go to hell.  I was already there!  They lulled another woman out from the back.  She must have rushed to the front; her bangs were astray.  She didn’t know where I was supposed to go.  They tricked a young man to the receptionist desk.  He didn’t know where I was supposed to go.  The first woman had disappeared briefly, then reappeared – with the names of two authority figures!  If one couldn’t help, the other surely could.

I followed Singing Andrea across the hall into another Fort Knox-type area in search of this mysterious person.  She wasn’t at her desk.  Singing Andrea asked someone about the second woman.  I followed her to that second woman’s office.  She didn’t know who was or where I was supposed to go.

I followed Singing Andrea back into the lobby.  “I’m sorry,” she hummed.

“Should I just wait?” I asked, clinging onto hope like a third-class Titanic passenger would hang onto a deck chair.

“No, because I don’t know what’s going on.”

Oh, God!  You’re kidding me!

“I’ll just call my recruiter,” I responded with a gritty smile and sauntered back to my truck.

‘I told you,’ it said.

My dog was even more surprised to see me.  I emailed the recruiter.  ‘Things still didn’t work out,’ I wrote.  Translation: they still don’t know what the fuck they’re doing!

I was exhausted.  But, at least I got to watch another episode of “People’s Court.”  I love Judge Marilyn Milian!

The recruiter called at 6:45 A.M. the next morning.  “There appears to have been some kind of misunderstanding.”

Deep breath – no!

This time she had a name; someone I’ll call Donna.  “They’ll conduct a special orientation for you,” the recruiter told me.

I’ve always known I was special – in a ‘Children of a Lesser God’ kind of way – so I started to feel warm and loved.

“It’s at 9; be there by 8:30.”

I wouldn’t miss this for the world.  Besides, my truck is multi-talented; it can run on water, too.  I arrived at 8:35.

Trickle-down gave me her best constipation-from-hell face.

Damn, girl!  Are your feet still sore?  “I have a name.”

Her eyes lit up.

“Donna,” and then, Donna’s last name.

She didn’t recognize the name – and didn’t have a phone number for her.

I started to get constipated.

“But, she has an email address, so let me try to get hold of her that way.”

Oh, thank God!  I mean, who in a company wouldn’t have an email address these days?

I called the recruiter’s supervisor who was also in Florida.  “They don’t have a number for Donna.  Do you?”

“Hm,” said recruit-supervisor.  (Shit!)  “Let me call you back.”

Okay, good.  I want to check out that art work again.

I waited.  And waited.  And waited.  And waited.

Trickle-down said she hadn’t heard from Donna yet.

“I’ve let my recruiter know,” I smiled grittily.

Recruit- supervisor told me to ask the receptionist at the lobby desk to let me into Fort Knox.  I could see the lobby desk from my second level view; it was barren.  No receptionist; no lesbian / virgin security official; not even a phone or a wax plant.  “Just go down to the first level and wait for someone.”

I hoped ‘someone’ would have a name.  So, I waited.  And waited.  And waited.  And waited.  I’d noticed some people gathering in a nearby conference room.  I finally decided to approach and ask somebody – anybody! – if they knew this mysterious Donna.

A young woman with coal black hair said she knew Donna and immediately tried to call her; she couldn’t reach her.

Constipation started creeping back into my gut.

Coal-black finally asked another woman who entered the conference room if she could help me out.  This second woman, a smiling middle-aged lady, uttered what I’d suspected for the past 24 hours; the company often had a failure to communicate.  Trickle-down wasn’t alone!  “I’ll find someone,” said Smiling-middle-aged and disappeared upstairs.

I waited.  And waited.  And waited.  And waited.

A third woman in a purple sweater approached me.  “Let me find out what’s going on,” she said merrily.

“Okay, good.”

Purple-sweater disappeared upstairs.

I waited.  And waited.  And waited.  And waited.

Recruit- supervisor finally called back.  “They’ve decided to pull the position.”

“Excuse me?”

As fate would have it, the position had evaporated sometime between the time I pissed in a cup and the day I arrived with my black brief case.  It’s just that no one below upper management knew it.  Until five minutes ago.  Texas time.

My truck and my dog were both glad to see me.  It was mutual.

This has been one of the strangest odysseys I’ve ever encountered.  But, it proves what I say in my ‘About’ page: I’m just not one for the corporate environment.  I’m too independent-minded.  I’m a true outsider.  Always have been; always will be.  I’m a writer; therefore, I’m a strange little creature.  I just don’t fit into anyone’s box.  Other people’s rules don’t apply.

So, this it.  I’m done with corporate America.  I’m starting my own freelance writing business.  Writing is all I’ve ever wanted to do anyway.  I’ve been writing since before most people started reading.  I was reading before most people were walking.  It’s part of my genetic makeup.  Thus, I see all this as some sort of sign; a twisted, back-breaking sign.  But, a sign nonetheless.  You dumb ass it said!  You don’t belong behind some else’s desk!  Alas, I’ve come to realize it.

Now, the Chief really begins a new chapter in his life.  Besides, my dog and my truck will be grateful.  And, I can watch more Judge Marilyn Milian!

Leave a comment

Filed under Essays

Tagged as ,

December 17, 2012 · 7:31 AM

Third Time’s A…Whatever!

FormatCube6inLLF8

Today, the Chief begins the next phase of his increasingly curious life – another job.  It’s a contract technical writing position – the third one in the past year.  The last two were pulled out from beneath me without much warning.  So, we’ll see how this one goes.  I’m trying to temper my enthusiasm.  A close friend of mine told me not to be so pessimistic; that people can sense a negative attitude and eventually steer away from it.  I almost told him to go to hell, but he’s such a good friend, and I don’t have too many friends.  Such is the plight of the writer.  We observe and write about human nature, but just don’t like to get too close to those human types.  Admittedly, it’s tough to be optimistic after enduring unemployment for the better part of the past two years.  Getting laid off from that engineering company was a mixed blessing.  The stress throughout that last year had become almost unbearable.

So, why would I put myself back into that maelstrom?  Well, there are these minor inconveniences called bills.  They’re like zits to a teenager.  You eliminate one, and another pops up.  They just don’t go away.  My student loan zits have become especially annoying.  They really just won’t go away!  They impact another little inconvenience called credit reports.  I suppose I could pack up and move far away to some isolated coastal community like a lot of writers and concoct a new identity to eschew those little pests.  But, I’m too tied to this community.

Thus, I reenter the corporate world once again; pushing my creative writing career just a tad further back.  But, I need and want this technical writing experience.  I love it almost as much as I do fiction writing.  I trained for it anyway; my English degree specializes in professional writing.  I have to make that pay off.  Besides, I reflect on my years in the standard business world and found all the crap I’ve seen and done makes for some great stories!  That’s the writer in me: always finding a way to humiliate the people around me without them realizing it.

1 Comment

Filed under Essays

Tagged as , , ,

October 16, 2012 · 5:02 PM

Still Bitter? Just a Little!

“Never succumb to the temptation of bitterness.” – Martin Luther King, Jr.

It’s been two years now since I lost my job at the engineering company – and I haven’t been able to land a full-time job ever since.  Each of the two contract positions I’ve found in the past fifteen months have been pulled out from beneath me.  It’s an interesting dichotomy.  I was so miserable that last year at the engineering firm it was almost a relief to be let go.  Key word – almost.  The only things I miss are the pay, the benefits and one of my favorite Mexican restaurants that’s a couple of blocks away from that building in downtown Dallas.

It’s a stab in the gut when you give your life to a company, and they reward you with a lay off.  People put up with a lot at work: bully bosses, rude coworkers, office gossip, office politics, piss-ant reviews, chicken-shit salary increases, traffic, bad weather – us working folk go through quite a bit just to earn that paycheck.  I had hoped to retire from that company, or at least work there until my writing career took off.

As tempting as it is, I won’t name the place, but you can probably find it on my Linked In page.  They were two years into a contract with a large government agency when I joined them in 2002.  They had a nice office in suburban Dallas, which was closer to home and where I’d work occasionally on other projects.  But, I spent the bulk of my time in downtown Dallas.  I’d worked for eleven years at a bank in downtown Dallas, so I was somewhat accustomed to that lifestyle.

The engineering firm had undergone the usual series of management and staff changes in the eight years I was there.  But, by 2010, when we lost the prime contract with the government agency to a small business and were kept on as sub-contractors, things were different – vastly different.  It wasn’t the same place I’d started with the week before Thanksgiving 2002.  It had gotten so bad that everyone I knew was looking for another job.  When I told a colleague not to say that too loudly, or they’d help her out the door, she casually said even our supervisor knew she was looking around.  The company had experienced a number of harassment lawsuits from disgruntled former employees.  Not all of them claimed victory, from what I understand, but it’s still a wonder no one returned with a shotgun.  Yes, people really can get that angry.  But, murder won’t just ruin your weekend; it doesn’t look good on your resume.  Mercenaries and military special forces can probably get away with it, but the average white-collar fool can’t.

My parents each have been retired for some time now, but they occasionally have bad dreams about their working lives; lives they left long ago.  Together, they put in a century’s worth of labor and came from an era where people went to work for a company and stayed there until they either retired or dropped dead.  I’d vowed never to let a job get to me like that.  Despite all the crap I endured at the bank, I never once dreamed of the place.  I don’t know why, but I guess I subconsciously realized it wasn’t worth that much of my time and energy.

Yet, for some ungodly reason, I’ve had two dreams about the engineering firm.  In the first, not long after they let me go, I found myself at their former corporate headquarters in California with the same project manager who had hired me.  A massive seaquake had struck not far from the coast, and a tsunami was approaching.  Our building sat right on the coastline, and everyone nervously went about their daily tasks, while preparing to evacuate to the upper levels once those alarms sounds.  My manager told me not to worry; that if I stayed with him, we’d be alright.  He’d lead me and the others to the building’s upper floors.  He’d been there several times in the past, but this was my first time visiting the place.  Then, I heard a distinct rumbling in the distance and realized the tsunami was on its way.  But, when the alarms sounded, my manager was nowhere to be found.  He’d disappeared.  As chaos gripped my panicked constituents, I calmly proceeded up the stairs alone – and then woke up.

In the second dream, I was getting ready for a meeting.  At the designated time, I stepped into the conference room – and found it empty.  I then began running all over the damn building looking for my colleagues.  To make matters worse, I was butt-ass naked.  Now, don’t get me wrong!  As a bona fide, red-blooded American male, I normally like being naked.  But, I didn’t care to be nude in front of the menopausal debutantes and lecherous old men who populated that government agency.  Alas, I couldn’t find my constituents and wandered into the break room – still naked – and sat down with my mug of ice water, a pen and some notebook paper.  I’d decided to start working on a new story – and then, I woke up.

Okay, I don’t want to get too esoteric about this.  They were just two stupid dreams about a company that had turned on me quicker than a rabid dog.  But, I wouldn’t blame a real dog for doing something like that.  Still, the dreams made me realize three things:

  1. Anyone in the workplace can turn on you.
  2. Don’t worry too much what other people think of you – especially the assholes at work.
  3. When disaster strikes, you’re pretty much on your own.

It’s why I’d proceeded calmly up the stairs in that first dream and why I said ‘fuck it’ in the second dream and sat down to do what I really love: creative writing.

But, am I still angry about what happened?  Well, in a word – YES!  Yea, yea – I know you’re supposed to let that shit go.  Put a period on it and move forward with your life.  But, here’s how bad I let that dump get to me.  In September 2010, I visited my dentist.  A back lower tooth had been aching for some time, and I was horrified to discover it was loose.  I’d just been there two month earlier, and everything was fine.  My dentist couldn’t understand what happened.

But, I knew what had happened.  I’d been under so much stress at work that I must have ground the crap out of it, and now there was no other remedy except to yank it out.

So, along with the paltry raise and office politics I’d had to live with that last full year, this is how my career ended with the engineering company: a loose tooth.  That’s it.  That’s what I got for busting my butt for nearly eight years.  Yes, the experience looks great on my resume.  All those technical skills make for nice business conversation pieces as I scoot in and out of companies now with a bloated grin; feeling like an ugly pitbull being shuffled from one foster home to another.

Resumes never tell the full story behind a person’s working life, but it’s just not that easy sometimes letting bad experiences go – especially at work where you dedicate so much of your life.  I think of that project manager who I’d considered a friend and mentor and now hope he has a radical prostatectomy that leaves him permanently impotent.  I guess it’s wrong to feel that way.  But, I don’t.  In fact, I really hope something like that happens to him and I hope other bad shit happens to some of those people.  Call me childish if you want, but – oh well.  In this rotten economy brought down by the wealthiest 1% and the politicians they have stuffed in their designer pockets – none of whom can relate to us average working folks – there are a lot of people who understand exactly what I’m saying.

Still bitter?  Yea, you could say that.  Still moving forward?  Oh yea!  A tsunami couldn’t stop me!

Leave a comment

Filed under Essays

Tagged as

August 18, 2012 · 11:58 PM

Just Bend Over and Pretend It Doesn’t Hurt

On Friday, the 17th, I lost my contract job with an IT firm.  Friday also marked one month since I started.  It was supposed to be a 6-month gig.  Now, it’s gone.

They hired me to be a technical writer and editor.  But, it turns out they wanted someone with a strong software development background.  Actually, they’d prefer to get an individual who is both a software developer and a technical writer.  They’d have better luck finding a black unicorn.

At least this job lasted one whole month.  In July of 2011, I landed a 90-day contract technical writing job that lasted all of 3 weeks.  The client pulled it because they weren’t getting the anticipated work from their vendor.  And, I never again heard from the recruiter who got me that job in the first place.  They just dropped me; the way a vulture abandons a cow carcass once they’re through picking over it.  This is starting to give me a complex.

I sort of saw this coming; the way people on Japan’s northeastern coastline saw that tsunami coming after the devastating earthquake struck the region in March of last year.  I know that’s a bit dramatic – almost an unfair and disrespectful comparison – but that’s how I felt.  It was a slow-moving disaster; gradually creeping towards me with no way to stop it.

It had taken me almost a year to find this job.  So, here I am – in the job market again.  As I’ve stated before, contract work seems to be the popular trend in business these days.  Most of the people at that IT firm were contract.  Less than a third, I believe, were full-time employees.  There were a lot of foreigners, too; people mostly from India, but also Asia.  Wait a minute!  Aren’t companies shipping these jobs over there?  There was even one man from México who earned his U.S. citizenship on the 13th, a woman from Romania and another woman from France.  I feel I should reinvent myself as a refugee from Nicaragua and somehow get an H1 Visa.  I might stand a better chance.

I’m just not used to this contract stuff.  A contract worker is a glorified temporary the way a hair dresser is a glorified barber.  But, that’s all there is in the early 21st century working world.  People bounce around from place to place.  My parents – who each worked for the same company for decades – just can’t fathom that kind of lifestyle.  I think my generation is the last accustomed to going to work for a company and staying there long enough to earn a reserved parking spot.

What can I say?  Well, I say to hell with corporate America, which I mention in my biography on this blog.  I used to play well with others in business; now, I just demand to be left alone.  What can I do?  Jump start my writing career of course!  I consider myself a professional writer anyway – although I haven’t gotten anything published yet.  I’m determined, though, to change that once and for all and get my book published before year’s end – hopefully before the Mayan Apocalypse.  Yea, yea, I know.  Believe it when you see it.

My father and a few friends have already told me things will “work out for the better.”  I suppose I could be that optimistic.  But, I’ll be more cynical and state emphatically that things never just “work out.”  Someone has to make it work.  You can rely upon other people to help shape your future, or you can grab the shit by the throat and shape it the way you damn well please.  Ultimately, every able-bodied, able-minded person has to fend for themselves.  Damn!  I’m starting to sound like a Republican!   I knew nightly doses of Bacardi and Coke would eventually have an impact on me.

2 Comments

Filed under Essays

Tagged as ,

August 15, 2012 · 8:57 PM

Working Enemies

If you’re experiencing problems at work, here are your 2 best courses of action:

  • Deal with it.
  • Get the hell out of the company.

Sometimes, the latter choice is the best, especially if the organization’s culture seems so incredibly corrupt that nothing will change for you.  Eventually, those companies self-destruct under the weight of their own arrogance.  It happens all the time.

You actually have a third choice: complain to the human resources division.  But, I’ve learned this can actually backfire and makes things worse for you.  Business news flash: HR is not your friend.  Their purpose is to ensure the company functions smoothly, which means simply making a profit for their shareholders.  If said company perceives an individual to be part of a problem, they’ll do everything short of murder to get rid of that person.  Filing a complaint of some sort – any sort – means something has gone awry.  Managers and supervisors can easily twist things around to make it look like you’re the source of the trouble.  Yes, sometimes they really do target people.  If you’re shocked, then you either haven’t been around long enough, or you live in a fantasy world.  Get over your denial and wake up.

Corporations don’t care about people.  As stated above, they’re only concern is to earn revenue.  That’s why companies rarely do things out of the goodness of their own heart.  They don’t have a heart.  It’s a company.  Mitt Romney may think corporations are people, too, but he’s as clueless as his trophy wife when it comes to the realities average people face every damn day of their lives.  Companies will only make things right, when their profits are threatened.  Then, they’ll jump through hoops and do cartwheels, especially if things have been documented, and an employee or former employee has stuff in writing; i.e. emails.  Believe me – I’ve experienced and seen this firsthand.

I know I was targeted several years ago, when I worked in the wire transfer division of a large bank.  One day in August of 1995, the entire system collapsed, and hundreds of transfers didn’t get sent.  They had to be printed up and dispatched manually; not surprisingly, a few got duplicated.  The largest was in excess of $200,000.  When the account officer called the unit in which I worked late one afternoon, the associate who answered the phone couldn’t handle her.  So, I talked to the account officer and took on the responsibility of contacting the receiving bank to get the second transfer back.  It looked simple on paper.  But then, my supervisor and manager decided to write me up over it; saying I hadn’t acted on it quickly enough.  I tried protesting, but was afraid to lose my job.  In retrospect, it probably would have been best, as I realized later they did everything they could to get me to resign.  But, I didn’t.  I made it through that period and stayed on at the bank until I got laid off in 2001.

That particular manager – who literally walked around with his nose stuck up in the air – resigned his position in early 1996 to work for an insurance company.  Only one year later, however, he lost his job at that company and then tried to return to the bank.  But, they didn’t have a spot for him.  My immediate supervisor – who turned out to be a mentally unstable hypocrite – didn’t fare much better.  She got transferred to another unit at the end of 1995, then booted out of the department altogether because of poor performance.  She came very close to losing her job.  When I saw her a few years later, she told me she was an administrative assistant; a step down for her.  I was an executive administrative assistant by then.  I emphasized the word “executive,” and I think she got the hint.  I don’t know what happened to either of them afterwards and I never gave a damn.  What goes around comes around.  Both those fuckers got what they deserved.  It was my only consolation.

That ordeal was nothing, however, in comparison to what a friend of mine endured around the same time.  He was a CPA for a large software firm and had become the butt of crass jokes by coworkers, which happened to me on a few occasions.  And, as in my situation, it seemed his managers had targeted him.  But, unlike me, he filed complaints with HR; thinking, as do most people, they would help him out and ease the situation.  That’s when things worsened, he told me back then.  But, something else was happening; something that ultimately would turn things around in his favor.  He suspected his superiors were deliberately sabotaging his work just to make him look bad.  I almost didn’t believe him.  In my infinite naivety back then, I didn’t think that would actually happen.  One manager tried to make a game out of it, he said, rejecting his work with coy notes and sad attempts at humor.  They didn’t think it was funny, though, when he walked into the office one Friday – and then, left at noon.  He’d resigned without the requisite two weeks’ notice – on the last business day of the third quarter in 1996.  He contemplated suing the company for harassment, but didn’t have the energy for it.  He was just glad to leave.  But, he said, they paid the price.  He learned from a former colleague that all the work his managers had mutilated simply to make him look incompetent and lazy ended up causing more damage for the company.  They had to spend time and money correcting those alleged “mistakes.”  Heads rolled, he told me with an evil glint in his eye.  What goes around, comes around.

There was more drama at the engineering company where I last worked than in an entire season of The Guiding Light.  And, just like the show, it was perpetual; it just went on and on, over and over; the same crap.  Much of it was self-induced, but other concerns were legitimate.  It was during my 8-year tenure at that company that I realized the truth about so-called human resources.  Because the company handled a multitude of government contracts, they were allegedly concerned about employees’ ethical behavior on the job.  Therefore, some of my colleagues tried to make use of the company’s much-heralded ethics committee, which turned out merely to be an extension of HR.  Every single person I knew who filed a well-meaning grievance with the ethics committee either resigned or got fired.

In the spring of 2008, three women took a leave of absence; one after another.  The first two resigned while still on leave.  The third managed to make it back and eventually became my supervisor; a hyperactive, emotionally-distraught creature who reminded me of that one perpetually-menopausal bitch at the bank in 1995.  But, I learned later that those first two women filed harassment suits against the company after submitting their resignations – and settled.  I also found out that other former employees had sued the company.  It doesn’t look good when a company that boasts high ethical standards finds itself in court, combating harassment allegations.

But, a company’s human resources division is much like a city’s police force.  Both are there to maintain a sense of order and discipline, but they really won’t help you.  You can respect them to a certain degree and work with them when absolutely necessary.  But, you just can’t trust them.  They’re not your friend.  That’s not their purpose.

One of my coworkers at the engineering company was a proverbial good old boy from Louisiana.  He didn’t have any college education, had spent 4 years in the Air Force and had a penchant for daiquiris, cheese and big-breasted women.  But, he was smarter than most people with a string of letters at the end of their surname.  He predicted some of us would get laid off before the end of 2010; months after we lost the prime contract with a government agency, but were kept on as sub-contractors.  He had dealt with the same people and endured the same level of stress and frustration the rest of us did.  But, he never felt compelled to complain to HR about anything – not even an ethical issue.  “HR is not our friend,” he told me, after one of those women who’d gone on sick leave had resigned.

Yes, I knew that; deep down inside, I’d always been aware of it.  But – in my past efforts to hope for the best – I guess I just didn’t want to admit it out loud.  In the cold, brutal world of 21st century business, though, things are much like medieval Europe.  We each have to figure out a way to survive.  We’re all left unto our own devices.  And, sometimes the best device is a resignation letter.

Leave a comment

Filed under Essays

Tagged as , , , ,

August 10, 2012 · 9:11 PM

Busyness

The other day, at work, as I waited for my lunch to warm up in one of the two microwaves, a woman stepped to the other microwave and – when she popped open the door – was surprised to see someone else’s food inside.  She decided to leave it there, in case that person came back.  But, they hadn’t by the time my food was done.

“They either forgot,” I said jokingly, “or they returned to their desk, and someone grabbed them, saying, ‘I need you to look at this.’”

“Exactly!” she laughed.

Friday morning, as I retrieved ice from the break room, I noticed two halves of a bagel in the toaster.  A few seconds later a man rushed in and snatched them out.

“I forgot!” he said with a sharp chuckle.  “I went back to my desk and got caught up in something.”

“That happens,” I replied.

I’ve seen that before – several times.  It’s happened to me.  I get busy with one thing and then another.  And then, yet something else comes into play, and it goes on and on and on.

That’s how the world functions now – idleness is no longer just a vice; it’s an impossibility.  None of us can sit still for very long.  Like hyperactive children, we have to be doing something.

I know I have to stay occupied.  My mind runs like a Bengal tiger going in for the kill.  That may explain my past insomnia.  I look at my stack of books and magazines and list of Internet news articles that I want to read and keep telling myself I’ll get to them at some point.  Hopefully.  Before I die.

People hate the term “multi-tasking,” one of the few curses born of the 1990’s; a decade that showed how energetic and prosperous we could be.  Then again, multi-tasking may be partly responsible for the extreme productivity of that era.  People rushed to get so much done within a small window of time.

In the late ‘90’s, I was an administrative assistant at a large bank in Dallas where multi-tasking had become embedded into the corporate culture.  We couldn’t just sit at our desks and look pretty.  No one had that much time.  Our division supported an affluent clientele, and those people seemed to demand a lot.  Thus, when one of them called, I had to act as if though I’d been waiting for them all day and had nothing else to do, except tend to their needs.  But then, the bank demanded a lot from us.  One morning, my boss arrived for a meeting, when he should have been at a doctor’s appointment.  I was scheduled to sit in on the meeting for him.

“What are you doing here?” I asked, as he staggered towards his office.

He’d forgotten about the appointment.  The meeting had taken precedence in his mind – the way the Ebola virus overwhelms the human body.  He stood there for a moment beside my desk.  I could see the veins in his forehead undulating.  He contemplated whether to proceed with the meeting or head back out to the doctor’s office.  I finally convinced him to visit the doctor.

“Your health is more important,” I told him.  “You have family.  This shit can wait.”

Work can always wait.  Nothing really is more critical than your health and your family.  Proof: just a few months later that same boss got laid off after nearly 24 years at the bank.  All the time and energy he’d put into his job?  Bam!  Smashed into the floor like a dirty cockroach.  It didn’t seem to matter.  The company had a budget.

But, I know that my busyness is of my own design.  It’s self-imposed.  I did it to myself.  I used to get upset when people disrespected me, before I realized I would let them.  It was their fault that they couldn’t bring themselves to treat me with any sense of decency.  But, it was my fault that I didn’t talk back to them.  Now, I talk back, and occasionally that gets me in trouble.  But, I don’t want others taking control of me.  Yet, taking control of my life has often left little room for what’s really important: my aging parents, my dog, my handful of friends, my creative writing that soothes my cluttered psyche.  I have to step back and swallow the frustration, then spit it back out.

It’s actually good to be busy.  Idleness is a vice – unless you’re trying to meditate and decompress.  I’ve even had to force myself to do that!  But, it helps.  It’s bad, though, to be consumed by so many things at once.  Extremes are detrimental to your health.  And, they’re not worth the trouble.  They never are.

Image.

Leave a comment

Filed under Essays

Tagged as , ,