Waiting on a Friend

Sometimes, everything is difficult. Even your friends.

It should have been a good thing when Lucky called Sunday night. It should have been an opportunity to catch up on each other’s lives. Share a laugh. Commiserate about work and aging parents. A pause in the rat race.

But Lucky is feeling the sting of late middle-age. And with it, the realization that whatever he hasn’t done will, at this point, likely remain that way. It has its talons deep into his flesh, especially in this, the age of diminished opportunities.

While marveling at his quarter-century with a single employer, I realize it was hiding more than anything. A college degree should have been a fresh start. But there was a fear in Lucky, a fear of leaving his comfort zone and trying something new.

Despite what we say on Facebook and on Twitter, change provokes anxiety in all of us. But in Lucky’s case, it was something more. It was paralyzing. And now his sense of life having passed him by has curdled into something ugly. Anger. Rage. Jealousy.

Sunday night, it careened into finger-pointing and accusations. He brought up a long-ago dinner he paid for, a dinner I had in no way, shape or form solicited. "It's on me" he said with a casual wave of his hand.

Now I know better. It was on me—for accepting it. It made me a parasite in Lucky's eyes.

It was a shot so cheap it deserved shelf-space at Wal-Mart.

Thankfully, there's another side to the story.

Understanding is an awesome responsibility. Sometimes, it asks us to tolerate the intolerable. In this case, knowing the depths of my friend’s discontent made it difficult to respond as I normally would.

But you can only do so much. You can only listen and try to empathize and offer the hoped-for solace of shared feelings and experiences.

It's not always enough.

Like my friend, I am in many ways embittered and sour. I struggle to subvert my anger and cynicism and jealousy at those around me who I perceive to have better, more-fulfilling lives. At those who, through no fault of their own, haven’t suffered the ravages of the Great Recession to the extent I have.

But Lucky left me something. Unintentional as it was, Lucky gave me a refresher course in what we become when the worst elements of our personality get the best of us. How we sound when the howling beast of regret takes center stage.

And how we so often (and so unwittingly) can subject those who care about us most to the worst we have to offer.

It was a cold, hard look in the mirror.

And that may be the greatest gift friendship has to offer.

La Piazza Gancio Finds His Flow

Several years ago, I wrote about an old friend named Lucky. He has the distinction of being the only person I know to spend twenty-five years with a single employer.

But it hasn’t been easy. Nor is it.

Interacting with twenty-first Americans in the context of retail frequently resembles punishment. One which should be meted out to deserving folk like congressmen, state legislators, city councilmen and garden-variety felons.

Misled by corporate marketing and an overdeveloped sense of entitlement, a public temporarily ignorant of corporate priorities demand that things happen the moment they wish them.

The problem is, unless possessed by multiple personalities, most employees can only be in one place at one time.

Exacerbating the situation is that, like your employer, Lucky's also believes that payroll must be kept to an absolute minimum, lest still-more emaciated corpses pile-up in the executive wing.

Maximum stress, minimum wage. Where do I apply?

One memorable day, Lucky found a “guest” rifling through the contents of the department stockroom. It seems the guest was time-challenged and could not wait for Lucky to finish with his customers.

When confronted, the guest took great exception to Lucky’s contention that the stockroom was off-limits to customers. The guest channeled his howling, righteous indignation and repeatedly attempted to intimidate Lucky by yelling “Are you through? Are you through?”

To his credit, Lucky resisted the urge to escalate the encounter and merely asked the guest if there was anything he could help him with. Frustrated (and perhaps even embarrassed), the guest stalked off.

I regret that Lucky wasn’t more familiar with the films of Groucho Marx, who famously asked in one “Shall I call a cab or would you like to leave in a huff?”

Inspired by this incident and by my own experiences, I wrote this.

It’s dedicated to retail workers everywhere.

Put shoes up
Take shoes down
Carson’s is a circus
And I’m their clown

Please don’t stare
I’m painfully aware
Of just how long
I been there

It makes me ill
I wish I could fix
The fact that I been here
Since eighty-six

Employer’s clueless
The public’s shoeless
I keep thinking
How long I gotta do this?

Beat up beat down
Self-esteem is just a noun
Like the bosses Rolex
I get wound

I caught this chump
In my stockroom
Bitch kept asking
Am I through?

I see his ass
Just one more time
He gonna wish
He stayed in line

The shoes get stocked
I get mocked
Maybe you should know
My Uzi’s cocked

Ask me again
Am I through?
My other gun’s a Glock
It’s loaded too

Employer’s clueless
The public’s shoeless
I keep thinking
How long I gotta do this?

Beat up beat down
Self-esteem is just a noun
Like the bosses Rolex
I get wound

The biggest irony
The seventh circle of hell
Is that fate demands
That I must sell

You the shoes
That walk on me
And kick me
Til I bruise

I’m a slave
You don’t need to behave
It’s the sale
I got to save

You want a better deal?
A bigger coupon?
Then log your sorry ass
On to Groupon

Employer’s clueless
The public’s shoeless
I keep thinking
How long I gotta do this?

Beat up beat down
Self-esteem is just a noun
Like the bosses Rolex
I get wound

Living Lucky

The phone rang. It was Lucky.

"How you doing?" he asked.

“No different than last time” I said. “How ‘bout you?”

“I’m so tired of this crap. I want to retire.”

I laughed in knowing acknowledgement.

“You want to get together? Have a few beers, shoot the breeze?"

“Can’t” I said. “So what’s up? You still have a job?”

“Barely” said Lucky.

“What do you mean?”

A long sigh. Then the sound of a bottle being emptied.

“Well, remember how I needed to make my numbers in June, or that was it?”

“Yeah."

“Well, I didn’t hit ‘em. Then I got called into Amber’s office, and I walk in and the district manager’s there. I figured it was the end.”

That Lucky figured it was the end meant, of course, that it wasn’t. What bullet had he dodged now?

“They give me this crap about how they’re going to go out on a limb for me, and how they’ve decided to give me one more chance since I’ve been with the company so long. And you know what I find out when I go back on the floor?”

“What?”

“Janie, our best salesperson, is leaving. And they finally fired this screw-up Jason, so they’re short. They’re not giving me another chance—they’re shorthanded. And with a big sale coming up. Assholes.”

I laughed. “So that’s a bad thing? You have a paycheck for another month, plus some commission. What’s the problem?”

“Those assholes acting like they’re doing me a favor. Piss on ‘em! They think I’m some kind of idiot. I sat there hat in hand and said ‘thank you’ and ‘I really appreciate it’. God.”

“That’s why it's called work” I said. “That’s why we need to be paid to be there. Who the hell would put up with it for free?”

Lucky huffed in affirmation.

It being nearly ten PM, I didn't want to further ignite his/mine/our considerable rage, so I nudged the conversation in another direction.

“You hear anything about that gig you took the personality inventory for?"

“Yeah. I interviewed Tuesday. The HR person is on vacation, but the manager said they’d like to move on it when she gets back.”

“Wait. So you have another job lined up?” I began to laugh. Lucky was great therapy.

“It looks that way.”

I collapsed into laughter. I couldn’t stop. I needed to investigate the possibility of having Lucky purchase lottery tickets for me.

“I’m glad you’re in such a great mood!”

I was able to stop only long enough to ask a question.

“Can you do me a favor? Look out the window and tell me if there’s a truck parked outside that says Publisher’s Clearing House on it and a bunch of people approaching your front door with balloons.”

“Ha ha” said Lucky.

“I’m serious! I can’t believe you!” I said. “It’s incredible! Every time you come close to being fired, it's like a giant bird swoops down and saves your ass! You're fireproof!”

Delirium set in as I pondered my friend. Life will seemingly not allow him to lose a job, nor me to find one.

The contrast is remarkable.

The Right Profile

I’m always grateful for the chance to laugh at corporate America. If reinventing the wheel and fixing what isn’t broken guaranteed success, America’s corporations would be world-beaters.

They would be the indomitable industry leaders their help wanted posts say they are—even without the corporate welfare, government subsidies and abundant tax loopholes.

The latest opportunity for mirth comes from a friend, referred to in earlier posts as Lucky.

Lucky is looking to make a lateral move within the company he has faithfully served for nearly a quarter-century. It is commonly agreed that Lucky is a fine person, and has done a wonderful job in whatever department he has landed.

But the new and improved version of his employer requires that Lucky submit to a personality profile, which guarantees a perfect match for the companies who use them.

This is likely the reason people no longer leave their jobs or are fired, because thanks to the personality profile, every hire is now a perfect hire.

Oh wait, they do. And they are. But now I'm not being a team player. *sniff*

Long story short, Lucky failed his personality inventory.

After determining that he possessed an unacceptable number of undesirable personality traits, the computer e-mailed Lucky at his company e-mail address to inform him that no further action would be taken on his application.

Imagine the employment that could have been prevented had personality profiles been in use when Lucky first applied twenty-five years ago.

Think of the profits, the market-share so cavalierly and ignorantly thrown away. They coulda been a contender. Sigh.

The same corporate America that brought you the Chevrolet Vega and Coke II has decided the personality profile is its latest panacea. Could someone cue Public Enemy's Don't Believe the Hype?

To paraphrase H.L. Mencken, no one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of corporate America.

Awkward

It’s awkward, this unemployment thing.

I’m talking to my oldest friend on the phone. For the purpose of this post, I’ll call him Lucky. He’s the only person I know who’s spent a decade—twenty-five years, actually—with one company.

Don’t get the wrong idea—his isn’t a tidy ascent up the corporate ladder to the corner office. Lucky has been laboring in a strata with a far-lower profile.

The thing is, Lucky has avoided screwing up, pissing anyone off or likewise calling unwanted attention to himself for nearly a quarter-century. It is a remarkable achievement. He has perfected the art of workplace camouflage.

He was smart-enough to pick a company that has never been the object of a hostile takeover, and a job that has never been determined by a financial analyst to be a profit-sucking hole.

He has successfully avoided the employment contractions that have become a fact of life for virtually every other person I know. In 2010, when fifty-something white males bear a disproportionate share of America’s job loss, Lucky has a job.

But judging by his phone calls of the past eight or nine months, he is convinced this will soon not be the case. Faced with sales goals for the first time in his work life, he is struggling.

Yet every time the guillotine is set to fall, there is a store-wide sale. Or a homeowner in need of a custom-made bedroom set. Only RNC Chairman Michael Steele has dodged more bullets.

If the twin pressures of a weak economy and working in the what-have-you-done-for-me-lately arena of sales aren’t enough, Lucky is also in the midst of a full-blown mid-life crisis. “What have I done with my life?” he asks.

I assure him there will be no statues of me in municipal parks, either.

As best I can, I caution him that 2010 isn’t the year to embark on a journey of self-discovery. I tell him 2010 is all about the survival. I can hear him straining against the newly-understood confines of his life.

The conversation then circles back to other things, like June’s unmet sales goals.

I confirm for Lucky that if his managers, coaches and supervisors really wanted him gone, he’d be gone. They would have waited by the door at the close of business June 30th and requested his name tag and work ID.

Lucky suddenly realizes he’s doing Chicken Little for someone for whom the sky has already fallen. “How are you doin’?”, he asks.

I give him the short answer and attempt to kid.

“There’s no way you’re going to be fired. I’m putting up a life-size cut-out of you and I’m going to rub its head every time I send out a resume. You’re Teflon Dude. Nothing sticks!”

My jealousy is showing. Friends aren’t supposed to be jealous of their friend’s lack of unemployment, are they? I have farted in an elevator.

I take a hard right and steer the conversation towards sports. “You think the Bulls are going to sign LeBron?” We then take the obligatory digs at each other’s favorite baseball team.

And so it goes until we simultaneously notice the time.

Like I said, awkward.