On Employment
Dave, my director, says that I'm a very predictable person. This was pointed out to me one afternoon in which I stupidly declared both, "I love black Jettas!" and "I love the North Side of Chicago!" and thus sealed my yuppie fate.
Remember when I worked at Starbucks last summer? Yeah, that was really predictable. But you should know that I must have worked at the least yuppiest Starbucks in regard to its employees. These were not white twenty-something schmoes with iPods, Jettas, and Cubs hats paying their way through a mediocre art school. If I recall, I worked with one Haitian woman who was trying to single-parent a three year-old fury of a girl, a young guy who wanted to study tigers in New Zealand and was paying for his education one GSU semester at a time, a very sad and bitter Tennessee tempest of freckles who definitely thought she was too good at Starbucks for our store, a 40-something year old woman who was working for the first time in 15 years after her husband divorced her, an even older British woman 5 years in America who may or may not have been working a sham marriage for the benefit of a green card, and our manager, a smartass from Trinidad via New York City who, now that I think of it, did in fact drive a Jetta.
Where were the employees with real emo quiet desperation? These were people with real problems! Who wants to work with people like that?
Me: "I need time off to go see a screening of Donnie Darko: Director's Cut tomorrow night."
Manager: "That's fine. I mean, Larry needs the extra hours because he's moving out of his parents' in two years, and if he can't work, there's a parking lot next door where Rochelle can let her daughter play for 6 hours or so. Or you can call Melinda, but she'll probably be drunk and sobbing."
Working at the Press, however, is like working with a bunch of future versions of myself that I would not hate: more cultured than yuppie, grad school drop-out, modest salary. All of them have some side project like a book or a band that they're secretly tinkering with on the weekends. And they all make really clever jokes that cross-reference a line in Sideways with Marshall Sahlins's theories of parapraxis. Except for the employees who still walk from their cubicle to their copier with their heads down and their stride lengthened like it's still 6th grade and Molly Perkins and her mean friends are going to jump out of the girls' bathroom and pull down their pants. Most everyone walks fast at the Press, and most everyone is also trying to read (often to avoid eye contact) at the same time, so collisions happen all the time. This is what a collision sounds like:
"Oh!"
"Sorr--"
". . ."
"...mmm."
The awkwardness of these collisions shames both parties into half-audible mumbles and crimson faces. Why can't people at the Press just pop the cap on their emotions? If they did, collisions might sound like this:
"Fuck, OW!"
"This IS the LAST time, bitch!"
"I do this on purpose because it's the only way I can obtain physical contact with you in a socially acceptable manner."
"[Sound of right hook to cheek]"
The weird thing is, I've worked at the Press for 16 months now, and I honestly don't feel any urge to up and quit. Which is weird, because I've never worked anywhere I didn't try to leave after 3 months, tops. Actually, it's the greatest proof I have for my theory that I will never actually have one definable career. But my Press job suggests something different. Is it complicity? Is it the fact that I am overpaid basically to copy books? Is it that sometimes there are free bagels? Yes, yes, and yes. The thing is, both of my supervisors are leaving over the summer now-- one is getting married, and the other is leaving with her band for LA to try and get signed with a major label. Optimally, this would be the time for me to quit and look for a different job-- after all, it's a lot of work to acclimate myself to a new supervisor, and I'll probably feel restricted, and I'll end up bitching to fellow employees about "the glory days" of the old regime. But strangely, I really don't want to quit. I've become quite attached to my computer and cubicle and my paycheck. The building is well air-conditioned. My seat is comfy. Sometimes there are free bagels.
Could this be my first employment crisis? The choice between safety and danger zone? The dilemma of money v. no money? Yes, yes, and yes. But it's a question for next fall.
As for this summer, I finally got confirmation that I'll be interning at Dad's Garage and making no money except for the occasional $100 bill I'll find lying in the parking lot. But it's improv, and photocopying, and it will be air-conditioned, and that is good.
Now I am late for work.
Dave, my director, says that I'm a very predictable person. This was pointed out to me one afternoon in which I stupidly declared both, "I love black Jettas!" and "I love the North Side of Chicago!" and thus sealed my yuppie fate.
Remember when I worked at Starbucks last summer? Yeah, that was really predictable. But you should know that I must have worked at the least yuppiest Starbucks in regard to its employees. These were not white twenty-something schmoes with iPods, Jettas, and Cubs hats paying their way through a mediocre art school. If I recall, I worked with one Haitian woman who was trying to single-parent a three year-old fury of a girl, a young guy who wanted to study tigers in New Zealand and was paying for his education one GSU semester at a time, a very sad and bitter Tennessee tempest of freckles who definitely thought she was too good at Starbucks for our store, a 40-something year old woman who was working for the first time in 15 years after her husband divorced her, an even older British woman 5 years in America who may or may not have been working a sham marriage for the benefit of a green card, and our manager, a smartass from Trinidad via New York City who, now that I think of it, did in fact drive a Jetta.
Where were the employees with real emo quiet desperation? These were people with real problems! Who wants to work with people like that?
Me: "I need time off to go see a screening of Donnie Darko: Director's Cut tomorrow night."
Manager: "That's fine. I mean, Larry needs the extra hours because he's moving out of his parents' in two years, and if he can't work, there's a parking lot next door where Rochelle can let her daughter play for 6 hours or so. Or you can call Melinda, but she'll probably be drunk and sobbing."
Working at the Press, however, is like working with a bunch of future versions of myself that I would not hate: more cultured than yuppie, grad school drop-out, modest salary. All of them have some side project like a book or a band that they're secretly tinkering with on the weekends. And they all make really clever jokes that cross-reference a line in Sideways with Marshall Sahlins's theories of parapraxis. Except for the employees who still walk from their cubicle to their copier with their heads down and their stride lengthened like it's still 6th grade and Molly Perkins and her mean friends are going to jump out of the girls' bathroom and pull down their pants. Most everyone walks fast at the Press, and most everyone is also trying to read (often to avoid eye contact) at the same time, so collisions happen all the time. This is what a collision sounds like:
"Oh!"
"Sorr--"
". . ."
"...mmm."
The awkwardness of these collisions shames both parties into half-audible mumbles and crimson faces. Why can't people at the Press just pop the cap on their emotions? If they did, collisions might sound like this:
"Fuck, OW!"
"This IS the LAST time, bitch!"
"I do this on purpose because it's the only way I can obtain physical contact with you in a socially acceptable manner."
"[Sound of right hook to cheek]"
The weird thing is, I've worked at the Press for 16 months now, and I honestly don't feel any urge to up and quit. Which is weird, because I've never worked anywhere I didn't try to leave after 3 months, tops. Actually, it's the greatest proof I have for my theory that I will never actually have one definable career. But my Press job suggests something different. Is it complicity? Is it the fact that I am overpaid basically to copy books? Is it that sometimes there are free bagels? Yes, yes, and yes. The thing is, both of my supervisors are leaving over the summer now-- one is getting married, and the other is leaving with her band for LA to try and get signed with a major label. Optimally, this would be the time for me to quit and look for a different job-- after all, it's a lot of work to acclimate myself to a new supervisor, and I'll probably feel restricted, and I'll end up bitching to fellow employees about "the glory days" of the old regime. But strangely, I really don't want to quit. I've become quite attached to my computer and cubicle and my paycheck. The building is well air-conditioned. My seat is comfy. Sometimes there are free bagels.
Could this be my first employment crisis? The choice between safety and danger zone? The dilemma of money v. no money? Yes, yes, and yes. But it's a question for next fall.
As for this summer, I finally got confirmation that I'll be interning at Dad's Garage and making no money except for the occasional $100 bill I'll find lying in the parking lot. But it's improv, and photocopying, and it will be air-conditioned, and that is good.
Now I am late for work.
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home