It's All Upside Down

As of August 27 I will once again be counted on the unemployment rolls.

Why?

Because I got a job.

Now, for all who have patiently listened to me rant and rave these last three years this is no time to be breaking out the good stuff.

This is not the job I was looking for. Not even close to what I am capable of.

This is a job where a Call Center Telecom and ACD Analyst/Technician is unloading trucks at the local Really Big Retail Chain Giving Walmart A Run For It's Money Store. A buck over minimum wage 20-40 hours a week.

The very definition of underemployed.

And by getting this job and being employed in my own way I am increasing the number of underemployed, driving up the unemployment rate because I found a job but well below my capabilities. Whereas when I was unemployed but no longer eligible to collect unemployment I wasn't counted as unemployed.

Follow?

You do? Really?

Cuz none of it makes any sense to me.

Understand, this job is not going to set things right for me. Not even close. It is not going to stop the slide begun three years ago. Three years. Nearly the entire length of the Obama administration. At most it is going to slow it a bit, but the slide will continue until something more gainful comes along. It won't stop the calls from the creditors and it will do absolutely nothing to ameliorate the damage done these last three years.

But I'm grateful to have the job. At least it will help keep the lights on and the water coming in, the heat running. Put a little jingle in the pocket and a pizza on the table now and again.

Or maybe even some Chick-Fil-a.

And it will get me out of the house and reintroduce some structure to my day. Even if it is a 6:00 a.m. start. Not sitting home staring at the computer trying to figure out What Now? Who next?

I've been staring at a computer for nearly 25 years now. Every day most of my adult working life. To be doing physical work (beyond going to the gym with some regularity) actually sounds refreshing. At least for now.

My buddy Mike got me in. In one of life's little quirks a job they wouldn't have looked at me twice for because I was overqualified I got because of a friendship with a man half my age, who could easily be my son (his dad is a year younger than I). He and I worked together at my previous company. Drank together plenty after work. I was "higher on the food chain" by a good bit. Now he is going to be my boss.

I can work with that.

The interview itself was the most awkward I've ever been through. A tag team effort by 2 girls younger than my older daughters. Reading questions off a page. Writing the answers down in hideous green fluorescent pen. No follow ups. No probing further, no discussion. Seemingly just a formality.

"Tell us about a time when you worked with someone to accomplish a task."

Are you fucking kidding me? Did you look at my resume? Read my application?

"Why should we hire you over the other 15 applicants we have?"

Because if you don't I'm going to take you over my goddamn knee and spank you you insolent little brat.

"You should hear something from us in 7 to 10 days."

I got the call four hours later.

So, by getting a job I increase the workforce which may sound like good news for Obama BUT because it is well below my abilities I am considered underemployed and therefore drive up that bad U6 un(der)employment statistic.

I will be working for a man I mentored in a way. Instead of the seasoned pro getting the young man a foot in, the whippersnapper helps the vintage geezer get back to work.

Johnny Fontane gets Vito Corleone a job grooming horses.

It's life turned sideways.

The rabbit hole turned inside out.

It is all upside down.

And thus shall I rant on.