New Surroundings

I have had something to look forward to for the last couple weeks, a trip to New York. After I lost my job, the idea came to me but I figured it was far reaching and unattainable. I'm not accustomed to having freedom with regards to time. I was employed steadily since 2004, and all of a sudden I had no idea what to do. I've been holed up for a month looking for jobs, but I am now going to take a week to be completely selfish. New York and I go way back. My mom used to let me fly alone as a kid to visit my dad. My grandma has lived in the same house in Levittown since the 1950s. She used to impart culture on me, albeit the touristy kind, but nonetheless. We'd see sights like the Intrepid, all the museums, musicals, and one time a jazz concert at the Lincoln Center featuring Wynton Marsalis. There's pictures of us at the Empire State Building and standing at the top of the World Trade Center. I was old enough to remember but too young to appreciate these days.

My dad hates tourists in New York but would brave places to take me to shows, something I've always loved. Over the years we've seen Chick Corea at the Blue Note club, the annual Christmas Carol show at Madison Square Garden, and the Radio City Rockettes. All the time and memories I have of New York stem from postive surroundings. It's been six years since I last visited, a time when I was still in college and not having to deal with the real world yet. I could just go for two weeks and not worry about what happened next. It's not the case now. I would love to leave the pressures of reality at the airport in San Francisco tomorrow, enjoy myself to the fullest in New York, and return rejuvenated at the prospect of possibility.

My best friend just moved to Brooklyn, which helped fuel my desire to visit. I hope he helps show me parts of New York I never knew existed. Touristy shit is fine and dandy, but this is a great time for me to see less homogenized parts of a cutting edge destination. Or maybe I don't need to see anything. Maybe I just want to sit and have a face to face conversation like old times. Actually, I don't know what I want out of all this. I haven't made a single identifiable plan for a weeklong trip to New York. It's pretty blasphemous when you think about it. People save money for years and plan every last detail for a chance to visit this incredible place. All I do is buy a plane ticket and hope the rest works out. I'll probably end up wearing my camera around my neck. My dad will tell me not to because that's what tourists do. He's right but I need some new memories.

I Love Gore

Not Al Gore, although I admire his efforts, but I mean real gore. At least in movies. Maybe I don't need to walk down the street and see a guy's brains leaking out onto the sidewalk, but when I'm watching films it's perfectly enjoyable. Last night, I saw a Japanese film called The Machine Girl, about a high school girl whose brother is killed by local yakuza. On her quest to avenge her brother's death, she destroys a slew of yakuza, has her arm cut off, and custom fits a machine gun onto her nub for maximum blood. The storyline became a little flat, but the excessive number of decapitations and disembowelments was truly satisfying. It wasn't just the physical acts but rather the time spent showing the aftermath that got me excited. The effects were such that with every amputation, an exploding geyser of blood erupted everywhere. And it would go on for longer than would ever be really possible. It put old Peter Jackson movies to shame in terms of blood levels. As a side note, there was also a sword fight with people wearing football pads. There's not much reason for me to write about any of this, I just enjoyed it in a time of otherwise monotony.

What's the Big Deal About Steroids?

I understand they are illegal not just in sports but in general, but even so. What is the big deal? All of a sudden, fans, journalists, coaches, and "straight" athletes are talking about how disgusted they are. I heard one talk radio host say his 10 year old son's life was ruined, because he found out his hero, Alex Rodriguez, took steroids. If that's all it takes to ruin your kid's life, then you are a shitty parent who doesn't take enough responsibility. Hey, someone needs to say it. Now, more than ever, we should really heed Charles Barkley's words. Athletes are not supposed to be role models for your kids. That's your job, not theirs. Ten years ago, it was the same media members glorifying stars like Mark McGwire during his home run record chase. Back then, they were willing to overlook his unavoidable weight gain, veins popping out of his neck, and acne. Journalists could have done something about it way back then, but they chose to accept it instead of asking questions. The level of hypocrisy is astounding.

It's about time for everyone to realize that sports figures are not some larger than life representation of reality. These days, it's rare to find a pro athlete that has finished college. Athletic ability is their forte, but I'm not going to let my kid take grammar lessons from Delonte West. And like any profession, athletes are looking for a leg up to be more competitive. It happens in some form in every industry, so what makes it wrong for athletes? Any given athlete can declare he is clean, but every player I see is an automatic suspect of using. In my own view, this doesn't bother me. As long as I'm helping to pay for their exorbitant salaries (which is a whole different catastrophe), they might as well be juiced up super freaks. If I wanted mediocre talent by average sized people, I'd go to a high school game and pay 5 bucks to get in the gate. The entire reason you are paying $30 for a bleacher seat at an MLB game is because you get to see the biggest, scariest muscles in the game crush a ball 500 feet out of the yard. Accept the facts and move on. Unless you never once paid to go see a pro sporting event, you are in no position to act offended. You wanted to see extraordinary feats of athleticism, and the athletes did everything they could to give it to you. Now you blame them for it.

I'm 27 years old. When I was 16, I started realizing something was probably up. There's a disconnect here, because as far as I'm aware, sports writers are in the locker rooms day in and day out. It is surprising to me that this issue of steroids never occurred to them. They were so busy burying their noses in every athlete's ass that they didn't realize that very ass was being pumped with needles. Now, these same writers put together scathing editorials on the same athletes when in truth, the writers were the ones not doing their jobs properly. Cheating in sports is nothing new, they just chose to ignore it at their convenience. I love people now saying, "I can never watch sports the same way again." Really? Are that many people really that naive? I have no problem if testing becomes a huge part of the game, but it doesn't make sense to me to do it at such random intervals. What's the holdup? If you want a clean game, test every player before every game. What's this once every couple months bullshit? Piss in a cup with officials watching before every game all season long. Boom, problem solved. What's the delay? But when guys like A-Rod start declining in production, don't complain. This is how you wanted it, remember? I liked it better when all of them were juiced up, but I seem to be the minority here. A bunch of guys taking 'roids has no effect on my life, and I don't see why it does for so many others. Maybe I'm just missing something.

Nothing Changes

Today marks 3 weeks of unemployment for me. It's actually really hard to believe that, because every day feels so exactly the same. For the first week or so, I could recall what I did on a day to day basis but this far in, no chance. I've had a couple interviews, but both are completely out of the question for a variety of reasons. The main one, though, is that each requires accosting strangers on the street and getting them to fork over money. Seeing as how I don't have a personality, this would only get as far as making a mockery of myself before being dismissed anyhow. The other thing bothering me about both positions is how desperate these places were. In one case, I landed an interview without sending a resume. I asked for some information and was asked to interview. I brought my resume to the interview, and the manager looked at it for maybe 5 seconds. Maybe. It definitely wasn't enough time to realize that I have no experience doing this type of work, but another 60 seconds later and the guy is asking me to come back for a second interview. Not only would I suck at this job, but the pay is awful too. I'm no fat cat millionaire who's used to raking in big money, but I can't support even myself let alone a wife and future kid on a full time job paying minimum wage. But there I go, breaking off on some boohoo, over the top, self indulgent tangent. Will someone please tell me to just shut the fuck up? My coffee is ready.

Job Hunting is a Full Time Job

The only difference is I don't get paid and there's no benefits. Every day, I wake up early to take my wife to the train station, which she uses to travel to her work. She's our only source of income, and I feel like a bum. I return from this three mile trip each day and make the morning pot of coffee. The adjacent dining room has the limited light of dawn for a February morning, and I sit there in silence knowing full well this cup of coffee will be the best thing about my day until my wife is back from work. I take it with a little milk, no sugar. I even drink it slowly. I pretend that my mind has the impression of an eventual uprising out of the impending dreaded reality. But I know it is futile, and as this thought vanishes, the unassuming grayness of the room is replaced by jagged sun beams attacking the peace. Having a job, this would signal the time to leave for work. This doesn't apply to me. I have no job. I went from having deadlines, meetings, and responsibilities to having nothing to do in one day. So, as the sun blasts off into my dining room window, my day starts by writing a brand new cover letter. I do this to at least keep my writing sharp. I am, after all, supposed to be a professional one. I can't send stale sounding cover letters for weeks on end without even attempting to modify them. The little self respect I have going for me is a product of this action. This and taking my wife to a train station and back each day are the only things keeping me level while the rest of my world falls apart. After pumping out a few different cover letters, I already feel like a battered gonzo. I get up and empty the leftover coffee into my cup. It is about 8am with an hour of cover letter construction under my belt. Unlike the first cup, this one I just down straight away. I pretend I have a boss standing behind me. I'm not in the comfort of my own home, and I must finish this coffee and get back to work. Actually, I am but nonetheless I drink it quickly and get back to work. Phase two involves looking for freelance writing jobs. I feel at a disadvantage in that only a few pieces of mine are published on the internet. I write the needy and let them know I have only the highest regard for written craft. I ramble on about my attention to detail and time flexibility, as if this will separate me from the rest. Please contact me soon, I plead to them. If you told me to write a series of articles on how Ashlee Simpson is undeniably the best musician ever, I'd go put on my favorite Isis record and do it for a pittance. After plodding my way through this process, I take a shower, hoping to start anew with a fresh outlook. Back at the computer, the next phase is the longest and most painstaking. As of now, my resume is on no fewer than five employment websites. Supposedly, companies with openings search for resumes and find people by what they are looking for. I haven't been contacted, so you can imagine my excitement to check my messages and e-mail every day knowing full well no one has found me intriguing enough to try out. I'm used to it, though, so it feels more like a daily job task than, say, rushing out to the mailbox every day to see if you got accepted into Harvard. In the same way, I scour these same sites looking for appropriate work. I find about four or five a day that seem on par with what I am capable of and interested in. I tailor the new cover letter even more for each one, then read over my resume for the thousandth time just to make sure there isn't a typo. Exhibiting one like it's a work of art in a museum would effectively end my chances with any company when the rest of the resume is bonafide cheese log on how important a role writing has played in my life. So, yes, I look it over more times than is really necessary before I finally push it through. After a few hours of this, I pick up my wife and have a normal evening devoid of worrisome job shit. We cook dinner, watch television, read, and go to bed. By 5pm, I am wiped. I feel like I have put in a full day of work, except there is no room for advancement as an unemployed loser wearing a pair of boxers and one slipper. I guess you could call this my cooler talk.