You know what’s crazy? I’ll tell you what’s crazy™
The New Job.
He was born 24 years ago.
Pudgy and protected.
He was the child who was smothered with excess and expectations and dreams.
The 1st child is a unique child.
So much anticipatory energy.
As the oldest, he was inundated with attention and momma love.
perhaps that explains his reluctance to try new things.
“A creature of habit” that one is, someone once told me.
But he was always a good boy, a good student.
It didn’t always come easy. He had to work for it, had to bear down, study long hours.
The creature of habit understood the monotony of studying, hitting the books, going for extra help.
Four years of college came and went so fast, like calendar pages blowing in a friendly breeze.
He graduated from college on the Dean’s list.
I was proud. He was cocky.
Perhaps this new generation of millennials feels entitled.
Perhaps Dean’s list means a six figure entry-level job in a millennial’s mind.
You and I know better.
We live in the real world, far from keg parties and fraternity row.
I got paid $16,000 for my 1st job.
Indonesian fisherman make more money smuggling carp across the border.
I didn’t care.
My foot was in the door.
I was working in my industry of choice. I was making a few bucks and gaining invaluable experience.
Until that first job, I didn’t even know what I didn’t know.
I look at the boy and I laugh.
He doesn’t know anything. He’s still a puppy wetting himself half the time.
$16,000 dollars!
He looked at me with Kaleidoscope eyes like I’m the man in the moon high on LSD.
He didn’t so much as say it, but his demeanor seemed to be; “I’m worth more than that.”
Don’t be cocky. Look for an opening and take it, I would tell him.
He would say OK, but I don’t ever think he thought it would take him a year to find a job, to even get a job interview.
It did.
One year straight, looking for a real career while working his movie theater job.
Night in. Night out.
“I’m closing tonight,” he would say decked out in a black vest and big button that said something about candy or coming attractions.
And he’d work 8 grueling hours, mostly on his feet, coming home after the last show, reeking of soda, his clothes soiled with movie theater butter.
“how’s the job hunt?” I would ask once a week.
“Same rejections,” he would say with a sigh.
And so it went. Day after day after day.
“Any job news?” I would ask, trying to implore him to take anything to get some real work experience.
Finally he told me something that astounded me. “I’ve put in 350 job applications. That’s one a day.”
I stare at him.
Wow.
Getting a job is still hard in this country.
“It only takes one call,” I say. “One call can change your life.”
He smiled, but like a birthday balloon losing helium, I could sense his enthusiasm waning.
And then on day 355 or whatever the hell it was, that call comes through.
I have a job interview in Alabama he tells me.
I’m stunned.
Really?
Really!
He is also cautious, not too eager to project a smile or any emotion that might open him up to vulnerability or weakness.
Like that 1st born child, the need to be safe, secure.
Change can be scary, different, so foreign.
“I probably won’t get it,” He says not even knowing how negative it sounds.
I understand his emotional defense mechanism.
Gotta be prepared for the worst. You don’t want to give the bullet a chance to get by the bullet proof vest and pierce your hoping heart.
Because life can be a cruel prankster that invites you to the big dance, then ties your shoe laces together. You gotta be on guard.
Clunk.
And when the probable rejection notice comes, you don’t want it to crush your world like a lumberjack chopping down a sapling.
Timber!
“Be positive,” I say straight from the dad handbook.
He smiles. “I will.”
And so he goes on his second face to face interview.
How’d it go?
I think I did pretty well, he says a little bit of enthusiasm shining through that hardened nervous exterior.
“You think they liked you?” I ask.
“I answered their questions pretty well,” He says pulling back on the bridle of enthusiasm slowing the wild gallop of the thoroughbred that wants to sprint across the wild open space.
A few days go by and no “thanks but no thanks” phone calls. The vibe is sunny, like a rainbow of light pouring through a stained glass window in a church preparing for Easter Sunday service.
It turns out, the 3 people interviewing him are all University of Alabama grads.
Hmmmm?
It really is who you know isn’t it?
And to all those who said maybe he shouldn’t go to college and spend all that money and…
STFU!
There’s a simple axiom in life. When push comes to shove and my kid is of equal and comparable work value to another kid from another institution, my kid bleeds Crimson.
And if the people interviewing him bleed crimson too?
Well as we like to say in Bryant-Denny Stadium; Roll Tide.
After a year of pushing ever lasting gob stoppers and twizzlers to tweens, he’s going to work for a nationally recognized company that does environmental impact studies for a multitude of industries in a myriad of locations.
It’s entry-level. He’s making more than my pedestrian and somewhat embarrassing $16,000 a year, but it’s not the financial windfall he thought he was entitled too.
Nope.
Nothing comes without a price, nothing comes easy.
If you want it, you have to earn it.
He has stayed the course, got great grades, and put in hundreds of applications.
Now he has a chance to prosper in a career that is of his choosing.
No more slinging hot butter and tearing tickets for Iron Man 3.
It’s the beginning of the beginning.
Remember your 1st real job?
Remember the sense of satisfaction, accomplishment?
Where the 1st born’s ship is sailing is anyone’s guess.
But he’s on board, now and up till now, that’s been the real struggle.
He’s nervous. I know that from the texts I’ve been getting about w-4 documents and what clothes he should wear.
“What’s office casual?” He asks.
I laugh. I was there once.
I text him back.
“Relax. It’s normal to feel nervous on your first day. Next week will be easier. Next month easier still. Soon you won’t even be the new guy anymore.”
“I guess you’re right,” he responds, his cyber hyperventilating subsiding.
Of course I’m right.
I boarded this ship a long long time ago.
Enjoy the journey, son.
You have many more exciting trips around the sun in your geological future.
Life’s Crazy™