June Blues

June was a busy, eventful month for me, so much so that I barely had any free time to, among other things, write. But being a writer, I will use any excuse to not put fingers to keyboard; at one point, I delayed working on the book in order to reorganize my sock drawer.

Seriously, who could concentrate on writing with that mess needing to be corrected?

My job at the UPS Store marks my return to the wonderful world of retail, something I have not subjected myself to for almost ten years. The job may be different, but the core functions are the same: deal with a customers belligerent bullshit while plastering a ultra fake smile on your face and pretending to give a shit about their inane problems.

I love helping customers

I suppose I shouldn't complain; I knew what I was getting into when I applied for the job. Of course, in my defense, I was being influenced by frantic desperation at that point; 10 months of unemployment had reduced my saving to nil, and I was reduced to swiping bars of soap from my moms place in order to bathe.

Sure, I could have just asked for some soap, but then I would have to reveal how low I had sunk. And a man has his pride.

Anyway, six weeks into the new job, and I can safely say that I am completely over it. While that doesn't come as a complete surprise to me-- working retail is about as enjoyable as walking barefoot over shards of broken glass covered in salt and lemon juice-- what does surprise me is the speed at which I am over it. Never before have I been so quick to write a job off; even my last job took over a year of constant stress and anxiety for me to decide, "Nope, fuck this, I want out." Believe it or not, but the assholic nature of the customer isn't the issue here.

That would be my supervisor.

The UPS store I work for is a small operation; there are five regular employees, my supervisor, and the store owner, who blips in and out like a lagger in a fps. My initial impression of the supervisor was that she was friendly and professional. But then, considering that first impression was in a job interview, it's understandable that I goofed; I'm sure she thought I was a charming young man who enjoys interacting with customers, so I guess we both lied.

Joke's on you

What I found is a person who delights in being right, whose desire to teach is tainted by a craving to appear knowledgeable and experienced when speaking to the underlings (that would be me and my coworkers). As I quickly discovered, this behavior has been stirring up a lot of issues and instilled the others with an understandable feeling of spite and resentment. Something that I am sad to say I find myself sharing.

The biggest problem is her teaching style. Rather than simply explaining something, whether it be a how-to situation or correcting an error, she instead has to make a game out of it. She will point to a thing and ask, "Tell me, what's wrong with this?"

Suppressing my urge to snap at her, I instead take a breath and respond, "I don't know, what?"

Having her ego stroked by my ignorant response, she will then explain what the problem is. At great length, whether you want her to or not. 15 minutes after, she'll saunter off, while I stand there shaking my head in disbelief, because a simple explanation would have taken two minutes, tops. Instead, I get subjected to a long winded lecture over something that I'm still learning to do or am completely ignorant of.

Speaking of ignorance...

No not you. This time...

On the second week in the job, the other new hire and myself ended up being chewed out by the store owner because we hadn't done an essential aspect of the job: sorting the old mail into a pile and then calling our mail box holders to inform them that they need to pick this up. Under normal circumstances, I could understand that. But there is one problem with the scenario:

We were never taught that. Our supervisor never informed us of this apparently crucial job function. And when we tried to explain to the store owner, he just brushed it off. Which doesn't appear to be anything new.

It seems that all of us peon employees have had similar issues crop up with the supervisor, and every time someone complains or voices an opinion counter to that of the store owner, at best they are ignored and at worst they get scolded.

This sort of repeated behavior has instilled an aura of discontent around the store from the employees, something that is amazingly overlooked by those in charge. Which is astonishing considering that store is a cramped room where everyone is packed in tightly like a bunch of clowns in a clown car.

Clown Car

Beyond that, the nature of the job itself is not sustainable for someone with as many money problems as myself. While I am working full time, the pay rate is not great by any stretch of the imagination; working as I am, I can make ends meet, barely; rent and bills are covered, and I can eat. But beyond that, I have no wiggle room; rebuilding my savings and 401k is basically impossible. Even worse, I simply can't afford to miss any shifts; I don't intend on playing hooky-- no matter how tempting it is-- but at the same time, shit inevitably happens; I might get sick or have an emergency that requires me to miss a day. And if that happens, I'm boned; the job has no PTO, and even worse, with so few people working there, your absence is felt and will instill resentment.

Meanwhile, as I was dealing with that mess, I had another one brewing at home: the need to find a new roommate.

With our lease expiring at the end of June, my previous roommate decided to move out so that he and his girl could get a place together, which was fine. The problem was finding a new roommate before the end of the month.

I posted an ad on craigslist as well as a few apps made especially for seeking roommates. At first things went well; I received multiple hits and over the course of two weeks, I interviewed a dozen or so potential candidates. Most of them were... not good. A few of them clearly hadn't read the ad, as they were smokers or druggies or both. Some were just awful people. There were a few good ones, perhaps three out of the bunch, and after much thought, I settled on which I thought was the best.

The best declined, having found a more desirable living arrangement. Okay, fair enough.

The second best declined as well, for the same reason. Grrrrrrr, okay fine.

The bronze metal said yes, and I breathed a sigh of relief. At that point, I only had two weeks left, and while that still left time to search, it was a bit too close to the deadline for comfort. The soon-to-be new roommate and I chatted over the next week, getting to know one another and making arrangements for getting the paperwork signed and all that fun adult crap.

Then came Monday, June 19th, and everything went to hell.

Nobody likes Mondays. Mondays are the chronological equivalent of smelly dog farts, rocks in shoes, Trumps stupid voice, and a punch in the face all rolled together. This particular Monday was all those other Monday's older, stronger sibling. It started off badly, and just went down hill from there. The entire day was full of the most shit-brained, ignorant fucktard customers imaginable. It's as if congress all decided to visit the store at once.

After enduring that epic shit-show, I trudged my way home. The soon-to-be new roommate was supposed to show up at the apartment and sign paperwork, thus cementing the deal. Instead, I got a text from him:

"Hi Darren. So some buddies of mine all decided to get a place together. So I'm going to go with that instead. Sorry about that."

All I could do was stare at my phone screen, outrage and disbelief warring to gain dominance in my mind. Outrage won, but only because that Monday had already been so fucked up that I couldn't be surprised that it managed to spill over into my living situation. After ranting at the the room for a solid hour, panic replaced the anger; I had a little over a week to find a new roommate, or I would find myself shopping for a new cardboard box to live in.

That entire weeks was an awful mix of panic and depression as I reposted my ad... and received no responses. The days sped by, and by the weekend, I was convinced that I was boned. That last weekend was spent packing my belongings in preparation of moving them to a storage facility.

By the following Monday, all hope seemed lost. But then my luck turned. I got a response the next day from who is now my new roommate. I interviewed him, and thankfully he seems like good people and not a shitbag like I expected; regardless of how desperate I was, I refused to live with someone who clearly wouldn't be a fit; I've had too many fucked up roommates in the past to fall for that trap again.

Narrowly, by the skin of my teeth, I managed to avoid homelessness. And while the job is... not good, it's still income. So I'm hanging in there. But the struggle is still real. My situation isn't sustainable in the long run, and so I can't afford to get comfortable-- not that I could be comfortable eating Ramen in a near empty apartment while frantically searching for a better job.