Episode Five -- The Lifeforce and the Kick Drum in Eddie Cochran's "Somethin' Else"

I haven't posted in a while, but a lot has happened. My dissertation continues to take shape. I am kind of obsessed with Richard Nixon, and I am torn between empathy and deep hatred toward the crazy corrupt son of a bitch. What drove Nixon? A mean dad and a lot of resentment. I wonder why I can relate to him so much? Oh, I keed. I keed, I say. Seriously, though, my dad is a prick and I hate everybody. Anyway, I think my dissertation is going to be called, "Suck My Balls and Eat My Shit." No. I probably won't call it that. But I might. Goddamn it. I might.

What else is going on? I suppose you want to hear about my job searches. I have been looking for jobs. First of all, I found a job on Craig's List for a tutor. This looked like a great gig: something like 25 dollars an hour to teach English to a couple of kids who just moved to the country with their high-flying flag-waving well-to-do parents. Then the guy who runs the agency screwed up my first check -- mind you, I haven't tutored, let alone met, anybody yet -- and he asked that I go ahead and cash the check, but wire him the change. Yeah. So he sends me an email explaining that I should go ahead and cash the check for three thousand dollars, then send him the remaining (I don't remember the exact total, but this is probably close) twenty-seven hundred. I wrote back and said "this sounds completely legitimate, and it's definitely something I want to be a part of" and then thought nothing of it. Do internet scammers have any shred of irony? You bet they don't. I get a goddamn FedEx with what I assume is some sort of check in it. I didn't open it, and I destroyed it. Then I wrote a very clear email saying that I don't want anything to do with you people and to please stop emailing me and please seriously please stop sending me stuff. I haven't heard any more from them since. So let that be a lesson to you: internet scammers do not have a finely honed sense of irony.

Right around this time I decided to be an insurance salesman. I decided this because I put my goddamn resume on those job sites, you know which ones I'm talking about: Profession Manufacturer and Godzilla. Next thing you know Old Jed's a Millionaire. No, he really isn't. But he is seriously considering drowning himself in the cement pond down the street. I get contacted pretty quickly by two insurance companies, Metropolitan Existence and Talking Duck. I go to a job seminar that Metropolitan Existence is holding first. This crazy fucker drones on and on about how it's easy to sell insurance and financial packages for them because they have a famous cartoon character as their logo. He said that makes the brand recognizable. Then they herded us into a room and made us take a battery of tests on laptop computers. The main test was some sort of personality evaluator. It asked the same six fucking questions over and over again in about seventeen different ways. Finally I said out loud "this thing is asking us the same six fucking questions over and over again in about seventeen different ways." There was an impossibly handsome guy there named Raoul who said "you got that right, my man." Raoul had been a lawyer in Argentina and he moved up here and wanted to get into finance. He looked like Antonio Banderas must have when he was just crowding thirty. I kind of hate guys with awesome hair but I let it slide this time since he was Latino. I heard a long time ago that ninety-eight percent of Dominican men lose absolutely no hair throughout the course of their lives. I realize that Raoul (not his real name, by the way) was not Dominican but you get the idea. The guy's got great hair and I don't mind. So he and I start laughing and cutting up. The guy who ran the "seminar" was nowhere to be found. I'll just tell you his real last name because I can't think of one that would even convey how hilarious I think this name is: Breedlove. Jesus Christ. Jesus Breedlove. Breedlove -- there's a lot going on there, man. And he was okay, as far as all that goes, I guess. He gave the presentation as if he had given the presentation about a thousand times. He also gave it as if only about one out of every fifty or so people who hear it actually pursue a career with Metropolitan Existence, and he wasn't seeing that special one in the ten he had before him right then. He kind of reminded me of Richard Jenkins, before I really had a sense of who the hell Richard Jenkins was. By the way, and this is what they mean by a digression, Stepbrothers might just be the funniest movie of all time. Also, Six Feet Under is probably a really great show, but my wife and I didn't watch it per the recommended dosage. We watched five seasons in a month, and pretty much hated everybody by the time it was over. We decided the show should be called "The Story of the Unlikeable Funeral Home Family." When you think about it, that obviously has a much better ring than "Six Feet Under." "Six Feet Under" -- you don't know what the fuck you're getting there. But I digress, as I said I would. So Richard Jenkins Breedlove the III said a bunch of stuff about how cartoon characters sell a lot of insurance and then he gave us personality tests on laptops. For the life of me I could not figure out if it was good to want a lot of credit and accolades or bad to want a lot of credit and accolades. I figured I would split the difference, which probably made me seem like I had a split personality. Those fuckers never called back and I guess I'm glad.

Then, a few days later, the HR guy from Talking Duck Insurance calls me up and asks me to come in for a job seminar. I figured my suit is out so what the hell. The guy who ran this was a lot better than Breedlove. This fucking guy was the greatest person in the world. He was Practical. That should have been his name: Practical. He would say things such as "our commercials are funny. You know, the duck talks and people like that. And if you say who you work for, people go 'oh yeah. That duck talks.' And they laugh. Because the duck is funny." And then he ran with this particular point: "And we show fender-benders in our ads. You can't show people getting hurt bad because that wouldn't be funny. Fender-benders can be funny. Not people getting hurt bad, though." This is really very true when you think about it. He wasn't done, though. He talked about a new plan that they have been having great success with. Apparently no companies want to provide their employees with insurance anymore, but they still want to seem as if they are. So said companies have basically outsourced it to companies like Talking Duck, who provides policies to cover the holder in the event of a "health event." Practical talked about how they don't discuss this in their ads because the ads are designed to be funny. According to Practical: "You take a kid with cancer. That ain't funny. But a talking duck, that's funny." And he really has a point. I have a duck on my key chain. It's awesome. It quacks, and there's a flashlight in there, too. But I don't have a kid with cancer at the end of my key chain. That wouldn't be funny. That would be fucked up.

I forgot to tell you the best part. I'm getting on the elevator, and as the doors are closing who do I see coming in through the glass revolving doors? You guessed it. Raoul, Mr. Handsome Nice Hair himself. The best-looking Latin American Lawyer I have ever met has an appointment at Talking Duck to attend the same seminar that I do. And he gets on the elevator and we crack wise about the tests at Metropolitan Existence and he asks me if I'm heading downtown after this to the seminar at the Prudential Building. How did I miss that one?! No, I said. I'm not. And we sat through the Talking Duck Practical Kids with Cancer Ain't Funny Seminar and took it a hell of a lot more seriously than we did the Breedlove Presentation. And I actually signed up for an interview with the HR guy and they called me the next day to set it up. I get there a week after that and the HR guy can't make it and who is my interview with? You guessed it: Mr. Practical Kids with Cancer Ain't Funny Himself. We hit it off like fucking gangbusters. At one point he was actually writing down things I was saying because they kicked so much ass. For example, he was talking about how people need insurance because bills come due and you need income even when things are going calamitously and I said, to show that I get it, "that's right. You can't press pause on life." Holy shit he loved it. He wrote it down and asked if he could use it. I told him I was flattered and that I hoped he would. Then he was talking about the way companies outsource benefits and how it's like said companies are providing benefits when they're really only providing a chance for their employees to buy benefits from a third party but it's important for employees to feel like their company is taking care of them. I, again to show that I'm understanding, say, "sure. The idea of employees getting taken care of by their employers is culturally-ingrained." He got really enthusiastic and said, "Culturally ingrained. Yeah. I really like that. Can I use that, too?" I again said I was flattered and said sure. I was killing. KILLING. This might have been my greatest interview EVER. And it went on like that and I managed not to fuck it up and I went home.

The next day, I get a call from a lady from an organization called Higher Inspirations. The lady said she saw my resume and asked if I wanted to come in for a meeting. What the hell? So I ask what they do, and she replies that they're basically career coaches and mentors and I figure I never had an effective father figure so maybe I'd pay for one. So I agree to a meeting and I go in and meet a guy named Pablo. I won't go into great detail here because I ended up signing on with their services and I am getting a fuck ton out of the experience. I had an hour or so meeting with the guy and was ready to go, but then I realized that I really am salesman bait and I can get really enthusiastic really fast. I mean, for two whole days I thought of myself as an insurance salesman. So I asked my wife to come and talk to this guy with me and she agreed because she knows that I am really susceptiple to salesmen and to Italian people. Anyway, Pablo said a couple of things that her dad -- my father-in-law -- said and whamo cablamo Wife said let's do this. Higher Inspirations is not cheap, but the set-up is quite good. Frankly, I've learned a lot about the process of getting hired and for the first time in my life (absolutely no exaggeration) I am optimistic about my career. I even use the term, which I always hated. Soon after the HR guy from Talking Duck calls and leaves a message saying he heard what a great meeting I had with Practical and he wants to set something up real soon. I tell him that I decided to go in another directions (Pablo told me he doesn't want me selling insurance) and he says okay and wishes me luck. Then a couple of weeks later he leaves a message on the machine saying practically the same thing. I can't tell if this is a ploy or if they just don't have their shit together. Either way, I left a message for him telling him that I decided to go in another direction. But thank you.

So after that whole thing got going I had to look in the Sunday paper as part of an exercise with my career coach, Mr. Roberto. I found a data entry posting in there, which I pursued and got hired for. It's only part time, but it gives me an income and a reason to wear pants and leave the house. The job itself sucks balls, but it is not as horrible as it could be. Nobody there is a coke addict, but there is a supervisor who constantly catches me in embarrassing situations. For example, one day he asked me why I was out of breath. I had to be honest and tell him that I had spent my break running up and down the stairs because I hate to drink coffee too late because it keeps me up but I need to perk up so I thought I would get that blood flowing. Then just the other day he caught be doing fake karate in the men's room. He didn't even ask. He just looked at me.

When I got hired for that job I said to the wife "now begins the climb upward." And wouldn't you know it? I got a call from the Chimes Foundation about a grant-writing position. I had a phone interview, then an in-person interview, then an interview with the new CEO who conferenced in the old CEO and cofounder. I have a lot to say about this but there has been no decision that I know of about whether or not I got the job. I should know really soon and it's fucking killing me. I had to put a ton of money into the car and into my computer because the hard drive crashed. I have been good about backing up files, but I did lose a week's worth of dissertation. Writing about all of this makes me feel better. It feels good to talk about it all, but I am reticent to say anything about Chimes. I feel like they gave the job to somebody else. That will crush me, but I have to be honest and let you know how I feel. God, it would be so good if I got it. I would have a worthwhile job, and a truly decent income. It would be great for the resume, and the work would actually be more than worthwhile. I would be in. IN. I would be so great at that job. I'd be in the realm of education, but I wouldn't be teaching. I would be doing something tangible with my writing abilities. Oh God oh God oh God how I want this job. I think if I had it I would have heard by now, though. I had the application out before I hooked on with Higher Inspirations, but Mr. Roberto has seen me through the whole process from after the phone interview on. As I said, I'm learning a lot from him.

Closing thought: there was this Chinese Lady down in the Subway station playing a version of "Country Roads" that would make even the most hardened maniac cry. She played the guitar beautifully and had a pretty voice. More importantly, she sang the words as if she knew what they meant. Knew what they meant. And I thought the whole thing incongruent. Until last night. Bad insomnia. Flipping around. Keep returning to a John Denver documentary. What did I learn? Turns out that the Chinese Premier back in the 1970s was here in the States and asked to take back to China with him 500 cassettes of John Denver. When he got there, he distributed them to the State-run Radio and they got played. A lot. So John Denver was huge in China. And I realized that must have been why that lady played that song so well in the Park Street Station right down by the Red Line. Take me home, Mountain Momma. Take me home.