I'm going to a job interview tomorrow morning. I've made a recent career out of looking for jobs while extremely underemployeed by my brother's company. Eight long months ago, my mom, dad, and myself were laid off... all working for my bro, who's corporate office is in another state. We worked at a warehouse that he had built in my parents' hometown. Prior to that, my mom and dad worked out of their home and garage and a storage shed trying to help my bro do business. So now, he has one sales manager, himself, and a part-time accountant to try to get the business back up and running. I've been doing consultant telecommuting... while being on unemployment.
My A.A. folks call me "bum". I've been laid off before... for about 7 months. But this time, it's been 8 months and counting. Not good. I went to a retreat weekend before last, and at a 10th step workshop, I brought up the unemployment thing, and my old sponsor, Dr. Death, said to me, "Quit lying to yourself. You're a bum. Get a job. Any damn job, if that's what you want to do. Flip burgers. It don't effing matter. Or be a bum. That's ok with me too, so long as you're ok with being a bum."
I'd heard it before. Didn't shock me a bit. I'd like to justify that the job market in my Southern Colorado town has always sucked and even moreso now. I've considered flipping burgers. I've noticed that I'm kind of old for that. I've considered working the graveyard at the 7-11... more my speed. Dangerous job? Not my dream job for sure. To get my unemployment, I've applied for 5+ jobs/week as is required by the state, some in person, some on line, some cold call, etc. I've been to several job fairs, workshops, etc. I was told that I have a very good resume. I did it myself. I have about 7 different versions of it. I like doing resumes and cover letters for various jobs. If the job market didn't suck so bad now, I'd do that for a living, as a hobby even. I was working under the table for a contractor doing home remodelling, flooring, painting, even plumbing... until I made the state max for needing to claim taxes. He worked under the table himself, as he was a laid off steel worker. Then he went back to work himself, so... I helped do a floor here and there, but I do NOT want to install floors. I don't have the knees for it, my hip hurts, my shoulder gets messed up, I'm allergic to epoxy. Waa.
I have continuted to do tech reports for my bro here and there, at 35 to 45 bucks a pop. If I got 3 or 4 of those a day, I'd be in Fat City. But then again, that would mean my bro is installing so many ESD floors that he'd have enough to hire us all back and I'd have an office to go back to. In my latter days with my full-time employment, even Carol noticed my frequency of posting had increased. Work was slow and I was goofing off. I was making about 35 cold calls per day trying to help the sales folks generate business for us and my bro wanted me to up it to 135 per day. I wouldn't have minded the cold calls, but I was ... we were generating nothing! I'd worked sales before and a 30% daily sales average was a darned good day and 20% was a bad day unless you had over 100 stops. But to get a goose-egg day after day after day... it was understandable that we got laid off.
I don't feel too attractive as a bum. I've had the opportunity to make many more meetings, pitch new drunks, gone to hospitals and the local CDU, and most importantly, kept a clean house and sometimes have dinner waiting for my working wife. She doesn't call me a bum. But... she gets into fear when I'm like this. She is glad that I don't travel like I used to, but ... what if she lost her job? We'd be on the street. We'd be finished financially, materially, etc. We live paycheck to paycheck pretty much. What I get on unemployment is barely less than what I got with my bro when you subtract off the money I spent to drive 90 miles each day to and from work. There are advantages to living near work or being able to telecommute. But I miss the drive. I miss the feeling of showing up by 8:00 am and having an office to go to. I've even had to back off a noon meeting I'd been going to as I think other non-employeed people frequent there and some with jobs leave early... I'm envious of their cool work shirts and their name tags and their keys, company vehicles, etc.
I've had to work out lately as I've gotten so out of shape. I recently had a major illness, bronchitis, and have eased into running again, on a Proform treadmill. I got the bicycles out, but it's been to windy to ride the last week. This may sound retarded, but you sometimes have to take a day off of job-hunting. It's not like I've been fishing and Harley riding every day. I haven't fished once this year as I haven't renewed my liscence yet, nor is my Harley running. I think I need to have the generator rebuilt again... forgot to polarize it after a battery replacement last year. Stupid.
I saw some pictures of me 5, 10, 15, 20 years ago and I don't feel to attractive now. Not physically, mentally, spiritually. ... "asking especially that it be divorced of self pity, dishonest, or self-seeking motives..."
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