I Learned a Not New Thing Again!

Today I learned how to use a copy machine. I am not going to say that I already knew of every achievable effect and alteration possible in the annals of copy machine options, but I did know how to make a copy, even multiple copies and even the two-sided kind. I've even been known to lighten or darken a copy as needed. Today, however, I got a tutorial —not one in which I learned all the mysterious and probably unnecessary options of a copy machine, but one which, for some reason, took nearly as long. The lesson consisted of learning how to make copies (just the one-sided kind) and how to refill the paper. I could see how such basic training could be useful and I wasn't about to protest some hard-earned time away from the meat slicer by alerting my instructor to my copying prowess. The problem with the training was not that I didn't understand the importance of it, but that it was embarrassing, very embarrassing. In a room full of people who doubtlessly are far more familiar with the machine than I, my instructor not only instructed me on how to complete the procedures, but also had me act out each thing as she did so. Naturally, I was a natural. Regardless of my ability, though, she had me fill and un-fill the paper again and again (to her credit, there were several different colored papers for me to contend with) until she was sure that I was not disabled.

My First Fake Job

Okay, so the gravy train —the one composed of the delusions of succeeding on which I rode in here— ran out. And I got a little more serious about getting one of those more modest jobs in "food service" or "labor." To tackle the job world in "the city indifferent" I began employing the tactics I had used in my futile attempts at finding other, more serious jobs: I followed up. And it worked! I am now a full-time deli clerk at a food cooperative where my extensive knowledge of postmodern theory can finally pay off. Sort of like post irony without the sincerity part.

Forget four years of college; today I received a lifetime's worth of knowledge packaged into one succinct, eight-hour gem of an orientation. While not-so-discreetly checking to see if we were literate by occasionally calling on us (especially the more foreign looking of us) to read aloud, the orientation speakers managed to drag us through everything we'd ever need to know about the food business. So I opened the floodgates and was immersed with some wonderfully new-fangled knowledge.

In a rousing round of role play I posed the following situation from a deck of situations, "The phone rings five times, what do you do?." This was not a trick because at a co-op people are straightforward and honest farmers (not millionaires with annoying food hangups). After realizing that there was no treachery in the question, my coworker responded correctly, "answer it," for which he was lauded.

From a generic work harassment video I was dismayed to learn that my time-honored mantra "look but don't touch" apparently doesn't fly in the food service world or any other world where one works with people. From now on I'll have to re-direct this axiom to the expensive food on the shelves so as not to throw off my entire world.

I learned that a co-op is not a place where the members divvy up the work among themselves, but instead a place where better people (the gainfully employed or, more often, unemployed trust-fund artists) pay a small fee to have underlings like me work for them. There is really a sort of divine order to this.

I even learned what 401 K is and how in a million years my measly savings will mean something. In layman's terms 401 K means that sacrificing one beer now means like five beers when I'm 50. This was very troubling knowledge because it means that I shouldn't be spending the remains of my measly paycheck on drowning my feelings of inadequacy in booze.

Marginally more perplexing was when the orientation directer made a well-meaning point about equality in co-ops and how that preceded formal rights for women such as voting. The director, however, confused the inception of women's suffrage with the date the stock market crashed and I am still unsure about the significance of such a mistake.

All in all it was a good day. I got paid to learn things I didn't need to learn, nor ever cared to learn and I got a free lunch! I really like free lunch.

Commencement: The Beginning of the End

Exactly two months ago I was a very successful college student. I went to an elite liberal arts college where I was the editor of the school's paper. I had prestigious-sounding internships. I was an honors student.

Today, after two months of job searching, I am unparalleled at scanning Craigslist for jobs I will not get. For employers that will not even acknowledge my painstakingly-wrought cover letters enough to tell me I will not get the jobs for which I applied. Today, I am dutifully unemployed.

This is not a story of procrastination, or lack of ambition or skill. It is a story of someone who is highly qualified, capable and hardworking. Maybe it is the story of a failure to launch, but I don't like to think that. It is probably a story that should be told so that is what I will do. I will chronicle as best I can the ups and downs (mostly the latter of late) of my life with a bachelor's degree.

In line with the way my liberal arts education scarred my formative years, I drove west right after the mortarboard I did not wear did not hit the ground. Free spirited, fresh and hopeful, I decided that I was not to be shackled by jobs or up-and-coming cities in my search for a new, warmer home. In my free-wheeling, willy-nilly thought process, I arrived in Santa Fe, " the city different," or my addition to the myriad of other plays on this mountain town's epithets, "the city annoying." I could go on about the city but that should suffice for now.

What is important is that I have not yet been able to get any jobs that require my degree. What's worse is that I can't even get jobs that don't require my degree, or any degrees for that matter. My scourings of Craigslist and the local papers have become more and more modest. Searches for "writer" and "journalist" yielded to "data entry" and "office assistant." Now my queries are sequestered to the fields of "food service" and "labor." Prerequisites are no longer certain majors or internships, but instead how much I can carry and that I be "over 18. " Life, however, is not so bad.

In my unemployment, I have managed to do lots of things. I read more now than I ever did at school, though I can't say much about the quality. I possess a local's vocabulary of the nearby mountains and trails. I know the fastest way to anywhere on a bike. I know where to eat and drink for cheap and my repertoire of price comparisons of the local supermarkets is superb. Happy hour times and dinner discount days are recorded in me like an inflected language. I now can run five miles at an elevation 7,000 ft. higher than I'm used to. I can also do a push-up hand-stand. So it hasn't been all that bad. I've heard not working is always much better than working but for the sake of my self-esteem I'd rather be working.

For now, I'll sit back and wait for whatever little money I saved to run out. And maybe, just maybe, I'll get a job. Any job.