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Cynth'ya Lewis Reed, click here
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I may not make millions ulike Tiger Woods, but at least I can get my piece in peace:
Seems that Tiger can't get "O" Peace, go to http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/10/14/woods.yatch/index.html
If autumn is a time of reminding ourselves to cool our jets, then why in name of Wiley Coyote''s Acme stock do we tend to do the opposite when it comes to mo'' money mo'' money mo'' money?
For broke writers like myself, as well as others I''m sure, we all fee that squeeze that ain''t nothin'' like the one associated with a roll of Charmin
when it comes to lack of cashflow.
It got to the point to where actually got online and found a temporary employment agency unknown to my
job-hunting eyes before. So I filled out the 99.5 questions they tend to require before even considering you as potential minion of Odd Temporary Employment
World where, in most cases, people look at me strange like I''m somehow out of place.
(Gee, I thought it was because I was black and speak articulately at the same time!)
Three weeks later, I get this strange number on my called ID, (Robert Half). I''m of course thinking, "half of what?"
So I pick up the phone. This cherry-pickin'' little intern voice asks "heLOOOO, may I speak to Cynth''eeeYah?"
I give the typical "who the heck wants to know" tone in my voice before she reminds me of the archive application that their system spit out to give me that dreaded awful "courtesy call." And you know what that means in most cases this time of year. . .
Telemarketing pollster.
I started not to feel sorry for myself anymore. They wanted an INTERVIEW. A real live four hour, see-if-the-applicant with two college degrees can type and drop a letter in a mailbox interview.
But then, after Ms. Intern spoke with me with this strange "are you real" look the interview, I walk out of the door to the marble-floored art deco elevator, all while fighting off feeling sorry for myself again.
This 50 percent maybe-maybe not, temp agency in Indy looked at my resume (shoot all I wanna do is make cash to send manscripts), and said exactly this, with her wise young 20-somethin''
self: "I''ve been here a year and a half and I''ve never seen anything like this. . . you look like citizen of
the year."
For God sake this is Indianapolis! Basically they put me in that ovequalified category I''m more akin to the description: broke and 2-smart-2-be-hired-by-cube-people citizen. Maybe that needs to go on my resume.
I may as well be the caulking on bathroom tiles, knowing how to hold the
pieces of an office together, but too strong to be part of an inflexible wall of "sorry that''s our policy" rhethoric.
So, after the interview, I ask about character references. For Pete''s sake I don''t have a criminal history; I''ve got a ton of little odd jobs that span
about four or five days of W-4 quality time a year; I try to peddle my book but appreciative readers of poetic essays are so few and far between on this side
of the planet; and I''ve sworn off office parties and red meat.
No dice. They wanted names of people who, in my case, are no longer breathing, breathing someplace else, retired, and living on what''s left of social security.
And to top it all off, I''m 50 and sporting an ever-widening gap in my naturally-colored teeth. My grandmama says that 50 is young.
Can''t argue with a 91 year old.
Hmmm . .My self is saying to me, "Reed, Girlfren'' just maybe you should fix up a secret fried chicken batter recipe, let your husband Kenny catch MITS to work
while you get into your one-car-family-car (after giving away the other one to your youngest offspring
in an academic achievement bet that reminded you to pick the mountains of Reno over the crap tables of
Vegas) and travel around the country trying to sell it to mom and pop restaurants who wanna take a chance of
a woman who really isn''t afraid to be part of the $200,000 and above tax bracket!
My lean white meat issue is this: What do these bill collectors expect me to do to get paid? Find a gentlemen''s club where I can shake my cellulite laden thighs for C-notes in a G-string?
(Some men are just that desperate.)Perhaps sell old cleaned up shoes on Ebay? How ''bout investing in a
shrimpin'' boat, like Forrest?
Oh, now here''s one: Relocate to Calcutta. Why I even bet I could get into their country faster than I could be let out of my own, thanks to exteme patriotism.
Oh, I-know-I-know! I can stay right here in Muncie, Indiana, the place where even the internist recruiter said was one of the bleakest places in the state to find work that matched my skills, or even the skills of a street bum. Hoping people realize that I''m a public speaker. And gee willikers, I might be able to get in good with that new place that''s going to rape another corn field on 29th and Macedonia, develop a rednecked vocal twang that might help me just nab myself
one-o-them-thar custom fitted for a blue jacket that has the monogram on the back: "How May I Help You?"
Somehow I had the Cinderella impression that it was like these people who were supposed to be helping me basically looked at my creditials (which I had spliced so I wouldn''t look "too" intimidating) and didn''t know that applicants in my category are mostly "functional" from having raised dysfunctional kids in a dysfunctional school system in a dysfunctional state
that has 49 other components when, all stuck together in a shoebox (with a swiss knife handle called Florida) is known as America.
And snookies, was I wrong about that.
Well, funny story ''bout that. This place was on the posh side of the suburb of Fishers which is becoming a carnival of pop-up industrial developments, this one
so fancy I call it "That Park" and new housing developments that any Stepford wife could nestle into perfectly. Me? I want no neighbors.
I''d have to talk to them on the way out the door. A cell phone and Life Alert and a little pomeranian named Spitfire are all I need... oh, and maybe my husband to give me cable service.
I decided to exit stage left as opposed to the other way where originally entered, "That Park" and saw that on 106th Street, there was a new mortage building had been built where I''m sure a herd of contented sheep and cows must have graved once upon a precivilized
period.
They couldn''t fool me with all that finery. . . I for one know it was just full of lego sections called cubicles... gray ones, six feet tall and six square
inches of working space, and no doubt full of financially lobotomized temps whose supervisor was also a temp in an agency who, like so many I''d "temped" for was in the midst of an intelligence
shortage. I promise they don''t know what to do when one of their candidates, (like I''m) walk in there with more than a GED who doesn''t need a template to
complete a work history.
I resisted "temp"tation and kept driving. About a half a block down, I saw where another field had been built
up. It was a church building slash cafe slash bookstore. Haaaaaaa-leh-LOO-e-yah! My work-seeking soul now found a place for me to lick the wounds of my soul.
A bookstore and coffee shop, attached to a church. Used to be a corn field that I''m sure Indiana will not miss that much.
Amazing, someone figured out that people will get to church more often if you offer a place to purchase food and books, with a daycare center to boot.
Well, sorry Starbucks, I think y''all missed your calling. My odds of finding a job might work out better in Indianapolis if I start having coffee with God, who must obviously be black like since the church was African American.
© 2004 by cynth''ya lewis reed
All rights reserved.
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M.Rose