I USUALLY run errands in the afternoon, but one morning last week I was restless and had a craving for Apple Jacks. So I hopped on my bicycle and headed toward the convenience store. For the first few blocks I zigzagged along, enjoying the quiet roads of my sleepy neighborhood. But as I approached the first big intersection, I realized something strange was going on. Cars were jockeying for position, horns blaring; the nose of an Audi came dangerously close to striking my rear tire. The light went red, my feet touched down to stop and steady myself, and as I gazed at the traffic backing up in both directions, I asked myself, “Where on earth are all these people going?”
Then it dawned on me ...work.
Yes, it’s been that long since I was one of them — 432 days to be exact. I’d forgotten about commuter traffic. And that morning, a second epiphany followed the first: I hate people with jobs.
I’m writing to announce that I’ve officially gone beyond the usual job-loss spectrum of denial to acceptance. I’ve hit a more obscure step, No. 8 or 9, in which you to come to grips with the fact that you can’t stand anybody who is employed.
Employed people, with their benefits and direct deposits, seem so smug to me now — bills paid up, money for weekend getaways and nights at the movies. “You didn’t see ‘The Town’ yet?” employed people keep asking me. No, I have no money. I haven’t seen “The Town.” (I have, however, seen “The Great Buck Howard” nine times on Showtime, but no one wants to talk about what a treasure John Malkovich is anymore.)
The problem, I find, is no longer my unemployment. It’s the people with employment — rushing past me on the sidewalk, ties in the wind — who are killing my spirit. I want to start tripping them as they race by, maybe throw an iced coffee in a few of their “out-of-my-way-I’ve-got-to-get-to-my-next-appointment” faces.
I wasn’t always like this. In the beginning, it didn’t seem so bad being unemployed, at least not at this time in history, when so many others are in the same predicament. At first, maybe I was even a little relieved by the rising unemployment rates — 10 percent, 12 percent, even 20 percent in some devastated areas. You see, I’m the kind of guy who never feared the Apocalypse or a nuclear holocaust because I sort of liked the idea of us all going down together. I don’t so much mind being turned into a burning ember or a nuclear shadow on a concrete wall as long as it’s happening to everyone else.
It’s when I’m a shadow on a concrete wall and everyone else is going on a picnic with toasty Quiznos sandwiches that I get upset.
Other things have changed, too. There was a period when I really missed work. One night about six months ago, I went back to the office building where I used to work. I just wanted to be there. I couldn’t go inside (my security code no longer worked), so I climbed a utility ladder attached to the side of the building and strolled along the rooftop until I was standing somewhere above my old desk. I missed it all so much. I missed procrastinating and stealing office supplies. I missed the one co-worker who thought I was funny and, even more so, the one who thought I was attractive. I even missed the guy who used to describe everything as “awesome.”
But that’s all over now. At this point, just walking past the employed on a smoke break is enough to set me off. I try to cover my ears, but I can’t help hearing some guy talk about how he’s going to get the pretty girl in the office to go have Thai food with him, or another guy rehearse the joke he’s cooked up for the afternoon meeting, and then I can’t help wanting to go up to them to say that the pretty girl will go eat Thai with anyone, and that meeting laughs are the easiest laughs in the world.
And the thing of it is, I don’t think I’m part of some lunatic fringe. I am nothing if not representative of the average unemployed worker in America; there are millions of us, and surely others have reached this phase as well.
To be honest, dear reader, my main reason for writing this is to warn you. If you’re ever rushing to a business meeting down a crowded street and you suddenly fall flat on your face, as if somebody tripped you from behind, know this: Somebody did.
T. M. Shine is the author of the novel “Nothing Happens Until It Happens to You.”
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