...About My Pink Slip Collection

I’ve alluded to it in previous blog posts. My job history is quite varied. In the period between my first job and stumbling blindly into a career path, I have worked at about ten different places. In our first blog post of 2012, a metric that is very obviously of utmost importance, I thought it might be fun to detail the hijinks I was able to get into during that time in my life.

My story begins while I was in high school. In need of money for video games, fast food, and Magic cards, I enlisted myself into the ranks of Kroger. I was a bag-boy, who also was responsible for collecting carts from the parking lot. Khakis were a requirement, and shorts were not allowed. Suffice it to say, I was less than thrilled about running around in a parking lot in Kentucky springtime weather. Bagging groceries, to the surprise of nobody, was incredibly dull. I was an introverted awkward kid who wasn’t great at talking to people, so my coworkers remained simply the people I worked with, instead of friends I could commiserate with. A couple of weeks in, I decided this wasn’t the place for me. Not knowing how exactly to quit a job, I decided on a typed letter explaining that work was cutting into my grades a little too much, and I would be forced to quit to maintain a level of excellence that I required of myself. Those that know me already know; that was completely fabricated bullshit. I was too scared to tell my manager that I simply wasn’t happy. At any rate, he bought it, and I left that particular Kroger quite pleased with myself. After all, I wouldn’t ever have to go back!

Kroger, if nothing else, taught me that having a paycheck was pretty sweet, especially when there are no bills to pay. I quickly set my sights on acquiring a new source of income. My best friend since second grade, Sean Przybysz (and yes, that name is spelled correctly) had started working at our local movie theater, Tinseltown. He spoke highly of it, so I decided to apply there. Little did I know that I was actually applying to be a character in a sitcom. Previous to working for the YMCA, Tinseltown was easily my favorite job. I stayed there for a couple of years, working every job in the building save for a managerial position. Each and every coworker had a unique personality. The various jobs at a movie-theater are all fast-paced enough that you are rarely bored. You can watch movies for free, as well as eat all the popcorn you could fit inside your little belly. There are ample opportunities to slack off. I can’t really say enough good things about my time at Tinseltown.

I started in the concession stand, as most new employees do. Looking back, I realize that that particular job is more of an initiation than anything else. It is hot, messy, and stressful. Still, there is a certain sense of pride achieved when a rush is defeated. Eventually, though, your trial by fire is over and you get to move out of Hell. My path took me next to that of an usher, a position which I retained for the largest percentage of my tenure at T-Town, as we affectionately called it. This job had a large amount of freedom with little control. We would rarely actually clean theaters, instead preferring to kick most of the junk under the seats. We had a schedule of theaters to clean, so we knew times when we could slack off with no consequences. We patrolled the hallways, vigilant for teenage punks trying to theatre hop. We felt like we ran the joint, and nothing could touch us. The only downside to this position is randomly getting stuck on the podium. Being a ticket-taker, required of one or two ushers each shift, felt like being a caged animal. There is nothing to do but tear tickets, and all you can do is look on helplessly as your friends come out of the theater they just “cleaned” laughing uproariously.

From there, I moved to the front of the theater, working in ticket sales. Tinseltown’s architecture involves four boxes that are inaccessible to the public except for a large glass window, a speaker and a hole to transfer money and tickets. These boxes each have sort of a back-room area, a place that nobody can see you unless they open the door that leads into the theater, a feat only a manger was able to pull off. They had heating and air conditioning, a stool for relaxing where there wasn’t customers to serve, and the speaker had an off switch, so that you could ridicule the customer to his face without him ever knowing! This position was fun but a little lonely. I spent many hours building card houses out of excess gift cards.

Finally, I moved upstairs into projection. Somehow, I was able to skate through my time there without ever learning how to put the reels together, so my only responsibility was starting half of the movies on time. Not only was this incredibly easy, but it also came with several hours of downtime with no supervision. Similarly to the box office, it could get lonely, but only boring people can’t figure out how to pass the time. I didn’t even have a smart phone at the time, I could only imagine that job nowadays. After some miscommunication with the managerial staff, I was eventually fired for not coming into shifts without calling in an excuse. Apparently the fact that I wasn’t in the state and had told that to a couple of managers before leaving was irrelevant.

I spent the next few months doing senior-year things. I went without a job for a bit, preferring instead to enjoy my freedom for the few months before I started at U of L. Once it was clear to me that college wasn’t where I needed to be at this point in my life, I started again on the job hunt. Somehow I ended up working alongside my friend Scruffy (not the janitor) on the graveyard shift at Meijer, another grocery store. It was our job to replace old price stickers on the shelves with new ones, and adjust the merchandise accordingly. Similarly to being an usher at Tinseltown, we had a large amount of freedom with little-to-no supervision. I, however, was not good at adjusting my schedule to my newfound responsibilities. Despite having to wake up at 3AM to get to work on time, I would still stay up until midnight each night, watching Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim. I didn’t have a car, or even a driver’s license for that matter, so Scruffy would come and pick me up. There were several times when I would wake to him knocking on my window. My day at Meijer quickly devolved into a mixture of sleeping in the bathroom and goofing off. Very little actual work was accomplished. Eventually, I started falling asleep in the middle of the aisles I was supposed to be working in. As you could imagine, I didn’t last long once that started happening.

I quickly hopped across the shopping center to a Target that was beginning a remodel. I found myself a position on the remodel crew, essentially doing the same job that I did at Meijer. This time, I adjusted my schedule accordingly and was able to stay awake during work hours. I worked this job with both Scruffy and Sean. Since we were making fine money, we decided to all move into an apartment together. Our friend and Scruffy’s girlfriend Brandy was our fourth, and we settled into a nice two-bedroom near a Gattiland. Not long after that decision was solidified, we all quit for one reason or another. Personally, I just got bored with the job. I’m not one who can stick around and continue a job I genuinely don’t enjoy anymore. The fact that I had rent to pay now was of little concern to me.

With rent severely limiting the amount of time I could go without a job, I headed up to the mall to fill out some applications. The first place I tried, Yang-Kee Noodle, offered an interview on the spot after I handed in my application. I accepted, crushed the interview (naturally), and found myself employed as a server/bus boy. This place was an interesting mix between fast-food and a sit-down restaurant. You ordered at the front, like any McDonalds or Taco Bell, but then your food was brought out to you by me. I was also responsible for clearing the tables once patrons vacated them. My manager had one arm. That isn’t relevant to anything, it was just really odd seeing him carry a tray on his stump. Anyways, I found that my lack of ability to fake enthusiasm for a job I grew to hate quickly pushed me out the door.

My brief adventure into food service had at least bought me some time. I was able to go another month or so simply enjoying the apartment that I wouldn’t be able to pay for soon. My father hooked my next job up, getting me an interview to produce ice cream at Graeter’s. I had big dreams; after all, I was going to get paid to make ice cream! How cool is that!? I imagined myself walking around a lab, complete with a white coat, checking on my various flavor experiments. Of course, reality was a harsh mistress. I found that I was in for many hours of repetitive labor, heavy lifting, and walking into very cold freezers. My coworker was a 45-year-old fitness freak who only opened his mouth to criticize me. All of the free ice cream in the world wouldn’t be enough to entice me to stay in such an environment. I waited for an opportunity to arise for something better. When it did, I was out of there in a heartbeat.

Scruffy had been working at Charter Communications for a few weeks. When he mentioned that they were hiring again for a cushy tech-support gig that paid quite well, everyone in our apartment jumped on it. I told Graeter’s I wouldn’t be coming back and scurried off to training with Brandy and our friend Brandon. Training was glorious. Being quite familiar with most of the processes already, we were able to spend most of each day playing Internet flash games and drinking delicious hot chocolate. Those two weeks remain to this day some of the easiest money I have ever made. Once training was over, Brandon decided he was happy with his pile of free money, and quit. Brandy and I hopped on the phones, ready to help out frustrated old ladies who couldn’t get access their email. I can’t speak for Brandy, of course, but what I experienced was something else. Almost every single person was angry and didn’t hesitate to take that anger out on me. Part of the job was anticipating that anger and being able to diffuse it, but it drained me. I just couldn’t deal with getting yelled at for things that were out of my control day in and day out. On top of that, we were expected to try and sell these people digital subscriptions after we had “helped” with their original problem. It was all too much, and I found myself getting depressed more and more often. I decided that I couldn’t stay at this job and be a happy person, and my happiness has always been paramount. I quit with no immediate plans for the future.

It is at this point in my life where fortune smiled upon me. I know I was truly lucky to find something that makes me happy that the weekend is over. I have only strayed once from the path that my mother helped me to find on that fateful spring day. Despite the endless joy I had discovered at Bowen, the monetary compensation left a bit to be desired. Caleb had a supremely easy, high-paying job walking around a train yard at a truck plant, and they were looking for a second person. Caleb helped me get that job, but the costs ended up being too much for me. I had to regress back to only working at Bowen in the afternoons, and my day was spent walking around outside in the winter. After only a week, I realized that the money I was getting wasn’t worth the sacrifices I was having to make. In a hilarious blast from the past, I was too chicken to cop to these motives for leaving, and instead leaned on the very same school crutch I had used to weasel out of my very first job.

Working for the Y has been thoroughly life-changing. Looking back on these various experiences, there are obviously many things that I would do differently if given the choice. Still, though, a part of me is glad that I made those decisions and experienced those things in the way that I did. Maybe without my experience at Tinseltown, somehow I wouldn’t have found such wonder at Bowen? Maybe without Charter I wouldn’t have had the drive I will be using to become a teacher? We are nothing if not a sum of our experiences, and all of those events conspired with every other minute of my life to make me into the person that I am today. We shall see where the sum of my future experiences takes me...