On Work
by David Ackley
Cook, cater, cut, no matter how you slice it, bone in or boner out, or what you call this, voluntary servitude, say, it's all fucking employment. After a while, getting a job drops to second place behind the juice of quitting. This is not fiction. I once was hired as a so-called job counselor for the Unemployment Office. I figured my own job would be secured by the number of people I turned down for benefits. Besides, it was fun in a way, inventing reasons. On the other hand, sometimes the problem was self-evident: The guy with the tube in his gullet from smoking, for example, who had a voice like Jacob Marley's chains, not ideal for phone sales. And Nutri-system was clearly not clamoring for the woman at my desk who told me she'd lost forty pounds since she still weighed in at a little over four fifty. Another I told: You're overqualified with your associates degree: this job calls for a high-school dropout with low self esteem. And the one after: Your mother's too old, you might have to quit to take care of her.
How did you leave your last job? In Good Standing? If they liked you so much, why'd you leave? Don't you know how hard it is to find work?
Denied. Denied. Denied. My wife tried to wake me from this dream, but I wouldn't come out of it: Denied, I told her. I knew what she was up to, trying to get on my good side so I'd reinstate her benefits.
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Heh. Love it.
Perfect! I'd like to print this out and post it on the board at Service Canada ( yep, that's what it's called now, here)
"After a while, getting a job drops to second place behind the juice of quitting."
Truer than truth, this line. And the rest.
*
Ho ho ho. *
To make an obvious observation, I like the way you cut and slice your first sentence here. A nice little entree to a nice little paragraph.
Thanks all for your kind and knowing comments, suggesting some bitter familiarity with that alien planet "The world of work."
A marvelous way to open -
"Cook, cater, cut, no matter how you slice it, bone in or boner out, or what you call this, voluntary servitude, say, it's all fucking employment."
I like this piece. *
David, this piece reminds me so lyrically of the foremost reason I remain confused: work is meted out as a privilege yet is required for survival or at least for social normalcy. The moment when education becomes a liability rather than an asset slithers here. It makes one still. The world of work affects the narrator's life at home. *
Thanks, Sam, I think the manic diction of the line tends toward a narrator maddened by the sheer fact of employment.
Ann,
We ought to remember that it's only after being booted from the garden that Adam was forced to "labor by the sweat of his brow." Next after slavery, working for money
( i.e. eating, shelter, warmth, survival) is the worst curse laid on humankind.
Bonus Points:
Why is " A Good Job," an oxymoron?
This is great! *
Lean and mean. Great! *
Thanks Christian and Nonnie for the generous thoughts.
That's why they call it work, David. :-) *
I chose to read this one because it's about work like the Bloody Vodka poem. Thanks for that. You totally got it. "no matter how you slice it" Yep, I'm working the deli and can't wait to quit!**