He wasn't wondering.

Reindeer boxer shorts rest limply on Conor Buckley's desk chair. It's June, so this is to be expected. The idea that someone would purchase underwear only for a particular season or holiday is ridiculous. He's had to explain this to a variety of overnight guests. He would be better served to use his breath on perhaps explaining why being such a slob helps him focus on his work. However, Conor can't actually do that. He can't do that because he has had "Art Block" for a week, and always does when his life's a mess.

Conor started off college as an English major, hence the borrowing and re-appropriating of the term "Blank Block." Conor would sooner say he had "Sex Block" when he inevitably failed at showing the ladies why he was an OK choice for the night (feel free to substitute: week or month, nothing more than that, obviously), than to admit that he's not always the most suave.

He's not-not suave. He's just, a — a guy — a guy in his twenties. And, he's figuring it out, just like the  rest of them...the guys, the rest of the guys in their twenties. Obviously he's excepting those who got tricked into a young-just-out-of-college-marriage. Everyone has a pair of friends like that, or rather, has a friend who has a wife or husband that you've had to become friends with because apparently they're going to be around for the long haul, probably longer than you in the end.

Conor's apartment definitely looks as though someone lives there, but not as though he plans on living there for longer than three months. Nothing hangs on the walls, but there are framed posters of Fight Club and Warrior leaning on them. The idea was there, it's the execution that's a consistent fail.

"Hey dude," Conor says to Patrick, his roommate, who's sitting on the couch Patrick's mom purchased for the apartment eight months ago. She came to visit from New Hampshire, had nowhere to sit when she "popped by" to say hello, so went to Pottery Barn and "made it right."

"Hey," Patrick returns. "How was yesterday?"

Yesterday? Patrick was referring to their mid-week debauchery. Conor had recently been let go from his job at some call center downtown, so decided to blow a hundred bucks like he had it.

"Fine — Jenn was there." Of course she was.

"Yeah, I saw her."

"Yeah."

Conor walks over to the pantry, opens it, looks into it for a bit, then closes it taking nothing out.

"She was with Katie," Conor continues. Jenn and Conor had never dated. They'd always teetered on the line. Sure, they'd made out. Sure, Conor had invited her over to his house after parties. Sure, they've seen each other naked. But, dated? No. "It's everything but the label," she had said when she explained why she couldn't do it anymore. "It's not the label, Conor, it's the lack of one."

It's not as though Conor thought he blew it with Jenn. By his calculation, he'd been the one rejected.

Flash to last night:
"Hey, there," Jen said, but, really it was more like a shout, from down the bar.

"Hey, hey," Conor said, smiling. "How've you been?"

Conor crossed over to where she was.

"I'm good. I'm fine. Katie's here."

"Yeah, I know. I saw her from the balcony."

"How mysterious..."

When Jenn smiles, she shows all of her teeth. She smiles, and she laughs. And it makes the people around her do the same. Conor never understood the phrase laughter's contagious until he met Jenn.

"So mysterious."

"How've you been?"

"Pretty good. Just working." Conor paused remembering he'd been let go. "I mean, I'm looking for work right now. Feels like a job. But I'm painting, and stuff. So..."

"Tell me about it."

"I just did." The two laughed.

"Funny. Anyway, I should get back —"

"Of course. Good to see you."  Jenn turned to go, then spun back around quickly. Conor was still looking in her direction.

"I'm here with someone."

She said it like he was wondering. But he wasn't wondering. And that's what's made the moment so awkward.

"That's great," Conor said, then smiled out of the side of his mouth.

They looked at each other, said goodbye again, and Conor proceeded to spend money like he had it.

"Anyway, she looked good," Conor said.

"Not a surprise, man."

Conor walks back into his room, closes the door, collects last night's clothes from the floor, then puts them on his bed. He picks up his jeans, examines them, smells them, then slides them on. He does the same with a green-grey t-shirt, then sits down at his desk, looks at his sketch pad, his reindeer boxers still on the seat-back.

Un-unique

Elaine Terre, Ellie to her friends, leaned gracefully over her egg white porcelain sink. Her eye make-up smudged all over her upper and lower lids. Trapped in the corners of her hazel eyes were the remnants of tears she was attempting to wipe away.

"I'm just done." She thought it out loud. "I'm just," a pregnant pause, an exasperated sigh, "done."

She'd been fired. It felt like a glorified dumping. Broken up with by the career that didn't want her anymore. Left alone on the skirts of Unemploymentville Co. Population: her. She felt like a cliché, and all of her thoughts backed that feeling up.

It happens to everyone. The phrase echoed in her head from a conversation she'd finished earlier that evening with her sister. Her sister, Carolyn, was an attractive young woman, aged 29, single, with a semi-high-powered career on the way to an actual high-powered career in fashion merchandising. She had little empathy for anyone when it came to relationships, jobs or general livelihood, likely due to her lack there of.

Carolyn and Elaine had a tumultuous relationship growing up, not unlike most sisterly relationships. Elaine, being the younger, found talking to Carolyn exacerbating, and would dodge opportunities to do so regularly —that is she until Carolyn would figure out a way to corner Elaine into conversation, often by trapping her in actual corners.

During the summers the pair would play a game in their country club swimming pool called, Spider. Essentially, one of the girls would hold onto the sides of the pool, often in a corner, with their legs spread while the other would have to attempt passage through the triangulated legs and arms of her sister without touching. If one indeed touched, even a hair, a strike would be marked. Three strikes and you would have to run around the perimeter of the pool. It doesn't sound as bad in retrospect, but summers in the midwest still brought about a cool air that made the pool a warm sanctuary once you were in, as the outside world remained an icy fortress.

Ellie thought about all those memories as she starred past her own reflection, wiping away her history and whatever Revlon still clung to her cheeks. Still, more tears clouded her vision.

Was I wrong? She questioned for the nth time. But she knew the answer. No, she wasn't wrong. And, she shouldn't have been as upset as she was.

It happens to everyone, El. 

Arc of Time: Life is weird and amazing.

I am not built for a 9-5, and I have no idea why I ever thought I might be.


Arc of Time, Bright Eyes

You can make a plan
Carve it into stone
Like a feather falling
That is still unknown

Until the clock speaks up
Says it’s time to go
You can choose the high
Or the lower road

You might clench your fist
You might fork your tongue
As you curse or praise
All the things you’ve done

And the faders move
And the music dies
As we pass over
On the arc of time

So you’ll nurse your love
like a wounded dove
in the covered cage of night
Every star is crossed
by phrenetic thoughts
they separate and then collide
and they twist like sheets
‘til you fall asleep
and they finally unwind
it’s a black balloon,
it’s a dream you’ll soon
deny

I hear if you make friends
With Jesus Christ
You’ll get right up
From that chalk outline

And then you'll get dolled up
And you'll dress in white
All to take your place
In his chorus line

And then in you’ll come
With those marching drums
In a saintly compromise
No more whiskey slurs
No more blonde hair girls
For your whole eternal life
And you’ll do the dance
That was choreographed
At the very dawn of time
Singing “I told you son,
The day would come,
You would die, you die, you die, you die…”

To the deepest part
Of the human heart
The fear of death expands
‘til we crack the code,
we’ve always known
But could never understand
On a circuit board
We’ll soon be born
Again, again, again, again…

Working

Here's a parred down version of excerpts from an e-mail I sent a few people regarding the day-to-day grind of my first real-real-real job working in a cubicle and my subsequent rejection of that life with built-in inner turmoil. All I can say is, time-wasting is the worst type of waste, so if you know you want to change something, get to it.

"I've just started this new job, I thought it pertinent information to let you know I am quitting.

"Yes.

"You read that correctly...

"I had been chatting with my dad [about my stint on the job so far, and really could only say],"Meh" about it. And it was bizarre. Larry, the man that just wants his kids to get jobs and fall in [the corporate] line, says to me: "Bridge, if you're not happy there, don't do it. You'll get something else." He didn't even encourage me to give it a little more time. Seriously. He went into a spiel about [his first job out of college, describing how he would] just get antsy. That's like me, antsy...

"What's weird is, I went out with some kids from [the company] the other day after work and while walking to the restaurant learned that mostly everyone who works [there] at the same position as me haven't even realized how long they've been at the company. They're content in a sort of job coma. I mean, it's got to be the benefits! I swear, none of the fun jobs offer them. My suspicion has me thinking that perhaps it's a way for the fun jobs to weed out the faint of heart. But. That said. What good is a healthy body, if it's only to serve as a shelter for a broken heart and a job comatose soul?

"Note: I am going to use it eventually in my book: My Life as a Non Journalist."

Other tales of working woes:
John

Susan

Middleness

There's even a whole website devoted to venting about your job. People need to man-up and leave what they don't like. Stagnant. Content. Interchangeable. I don't like that. If you google "I hate my job" in quotes you get over three-million sites. That's sad. It seems other people are less acclimated to life in a paid-to-go-to-a-place-that-feels-like-a-punishment.

How to Not Be Depressed During a Depression

1. Remember at least once daily, at least you’re not dead or dying. Don’t say things like, “But then I wouldn’t have to deal with this sh*t” right after. People will become worried about you, no matter how true the statement.

2. Write down five things you love each day, even if they’re seemingly dumb. Example: reading, capitalism, road trips, earrings, & lists

3. Blink a lot when you feel like you might start crying. Whatever you do, don’t let the tears well up, they will fall, and you will look and or be pathetic. You know what, carry tissues with you at all times.

4. Read a lot of books, and tell yourself things like: You’ll look back on this period as a great time in your life. At least you still have eyes. At least you can still process this novel intelligently. Look, you read a crap ton of Ayn Rand. You’ve always wanted to do that.

5. Listen to your iPod extraordinarily loudly whenever parents, siblings or friends attempt advice, which will not only be the opposite of helping, but will annoy you to no end.

6. Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. Meaning, if someone says they might be able to help you, don’t believe them until you’ve got your first paycheck in tow and you’re walking into a bank.

7. Substitute teach. Seriously, it’s a great way to make a few, and you get to feel intellectually superior to at least someone.

8. Continue donating money to good causes. You will feel better and you will have helped out someone else.

9. Volunteer. Even though it’s not a real job and you don’t get paid, it’s still a solid thing to jot down in your schedule. Filling up time slots is important.

10. Catch up on all that sleep you missed out on during those all night study sessions that really helped you get to this great place you are in now.

11. Take a deep breath. The water’s not warm. They lied.

Addendum: Don't think about what you don't have.

Middle: A No Mans Land

So, I'm in that land called, "The Middle." The one where you're not a full-time student, or even part-time, but you're also not employed. College is done, I've kissed it goodbye, and now I'm in the middle. To celebrate this awkward and at times depressing future, I've begun to write for a lovely little blog called Middleness. [Note, I just wrote Middlemess on accident, but that seems apt.]

Anyway, check it out. It's for people like me. Middlers.

jim ward. post-graduates. holidays.

I usually forget about music in the morning. But it's a great way to rev up the day. So, today I woke up, read a few chapters in Nick Hornby's "Slam" and flipped on my iTunes. Jim Ward, didn't even realize I had the man on my computer, but wow, yeah me for putting this on. I'm sure it was a last minute snatch from KRUI before I headed out those doors into post-grad life. Post-grad life is kind of like being a Post-Op patient at a hospital. Everyone wants to know how you're life has or will change thanks to the operation/graduation, they want to know what you're up to, how and if they can help, maybe make a casserole to bear the brunt of the no-job front. Well, that last part's mostly for post-graduates. Anyway, my parents had a gathering at our home last night, so I caught up with all of their friends, filled them in on me, ask questions about them and theirs; it was good. I enjoy that sort of thing. Asking questions, learning about others, filling in the blanks. Perhaps that's why I like journalism and news. But these days I'm heading in all directions. Aiming for anything and everything, but not loosing sight of what I want myself to look like at the end of the day. So, we'll see how this all pans out. I'll fill in all the rest later.

lacking caffeine and that life zeal business

Hi. I've been a bit lackadaisical about updating this bad-boy right here. Sorry. I can't believe it's been about two weeks since. Much has happened. Here's the bulleted list.

a. Kerstin, my friend since 3rd grade, visited San Francisco over this past weekend. [went to Alcatraz, shopped, dined, bar-hopped, and had a party for my housemate, Nancy.]

b. The weekend prior I was in Chicago visiting my family and friends and going to my cousin Maureen's wedding. It was beautiful. I also managed to pick some apples, grab dinner with my girls and boy and bonded in Rebecca's living room.

c. I've got about a month left of my internship here at Ode. It feels good to know how this place ticks, adding in my own two cents in the possibilities section. Really, I'll miss it when I'm gone.

d. I'm going to Vegas this weekend. Brian is meeting me at the Las Vegas airport, and Meagan and Dan Walsh (our married friends, weird) are going to pick us up for a fun weekend. Planning on a little skydiving, some Black Jack, sassy dresses and a show!

e. Already I am being harassed by my mother about not having a full-time job lined up post internship. It's stressful enough as it is. Damn all my smart friends who went back to graduate school.

f. I think that's it. Whew. Oh, and I'm planning a trip to LA post Ode in November before heading back home. Should be a fun time.

And, of course, a story: Monday I waited for Marco for 45 minutes only to find out that he was at the chiropractor. I called my other possible ride about 6 times before getting a hold of her. All I had to do was walk/bus to this way far corner. I think I lost a pound before 9 am Monday. I probably sped walked 3 miles in a 1/2 hour. I might as well have been running. I did manage to hop a bus and didn't even have to pay because I got off before I could make it to the front of the bus to drop my change. There's nothing quite like beating the system. That buck-fifty was mine!

Today

Notes on Today.

-I took my coffee to work in a washed-out tomato jar. Explanation: My roommate nabbed my to-go mug, thus causing me to search the kitchen for a re-sealable container. Tomato jar was the only option.

-I reviewed the job applications I sent last night: One to U.S. News & World Report. (I accidentally wrote "form" instead of "from." That's a bummer. I can never decide if I should email them letting them know I found the error, or not email them and hope they didn't notice. If I emailed them and they didn't notice, then I'd just be drawing attention to this error. OR. They noticed and they wanted me to email them saying I found the error, thus showing my wonderful skillz as a journalist. It is toward the end, so if they got that far in the cover letter, perhaps they decided they wanted me, but then changed their minds once seeing "form." Damn. If only it wasn't 11:23 p.m. when I shot it off last night.

-I can no longer do multiplication. I tried to figure out how much a year $12/hour at 40 hours a week would get me. Somehow I came out with $13,040. I was about 10 grand off. Good thing I'm not studying to be a mathematician. (Note: the word "mathematician" looks not unlike martian. Concordance? Anyone?)

A Nation of College Graduates

Sure, I'm a fan of higher education. I'm a college graduate myself. But these days, college degrees don't mean a whole lot. Unfortunately. Actually, education in the United States at least (prepare yourself for a sweeping generalization) doesn't mean that much. This afternoon I read this piece on The Star Ledger's website HERE. Well, it's nice to see that students are doing well on SATs and such, but standardized testing doesn't mean that much either. See. In the article the school touts the testing system as a valid form of measuring success. But from my perspective, having gone to a state school, gone through the motions of public elementary and secondary education, these tests only measure clearly commonplace status: "average."

"This year's SAT averages in themselves are not all that notable, as they were close to those in 2007 and typically change little from year to year.

Nationally, the averages didn't shift a single point from last year: 515 in math, 502 in reading, and 494 in writing, each out of a maximum 800."
-The Star Ledger

The article also makes mention that most if not all of the students from the particular school in New Jersey intend to go to college, and actually plan on going to instate colleges. The principal of the school had the audacity to say it might be that they don't want to travel too far or it "might" be that higher education is expensive. Of course that's why they're going to instate schools. College is extraordinarily expensive, especially when you measure the gains of going. Yes, you're more intelligent, but upon graduation, since so many people are going to colleges there literally aren't enough jobs to go around. And for how many seemingly blank checks students are filling out to no end, there should be jobs that pay more than the crippling dolla-dolla-bills that young graduates are might be getting out of college. Depending on which internship one accepts or not.

As a graduate with a liberal arts degrees in both Journalism and English, I can say with certainty that the education system in the United States cares more about the institution — those it employs and ever-increasing profit margins — than the students attending the school who are emptying out their piggy bank's worth of life savings just to be there. I went to the University of Iowa, and I worked hard. I enjoyed my college experience, but that's what it was, an experience. I worked all four years (yes, I finished in four years); I participated in clubs and organizations ranging from the Newman Center to University Choir; I wrote for The Daily Iowan, was Executive Editor, Managing Director and writer at Content Magazine and was a DJ at KRUI 89.7; I worked summers. I tried hard, all in the name of getting a career rolling. I did well.

Crossing the stage, shaking hands of the professors and various university officials (all making well into the $50k-$150k range, I thought of them at their graduation. I thought of who their terrible speaker was, of who they thought they were going to be 20, 40, 60 years from their meager 20-something days. Ten professors were honored for over two hours, the last hour was dedicated to the thousands of students that paid the most expensive price of admission to that basketball stadium. For a few seconds we were honored, but it didn't seem like it was about us at all.

Now I am living in California for a short stint interning for penny's (more than many of my peers are making as they intern for free, see Reality Bites below). As I attempt to flee working a dead end job that will at least give me health care, I'm here without any real cash — save for my piggy bank. I have to dig deeper into debt, because that seems to be the only way to get ahead in this world. You have to spend money to make it. And it's ridiculous. Everyone is trying to make money, but in their desire to gain a bonus they're essentially robbing the very people that make their company go-go-go. And, for the most part, company executives don't do this intentionally. Many people have mouths to feed and bills to pay, and to each his own, right? Take care of self first, right? The only way to sustain existence, right? As a 22-year-old University of Iowa graduate, Lake Forest High School graduate, Deerfield Junior High graduate, as a learned person, as someone worth employing, why does even a $35,000 job make it hard to make ends meet? By the time rent's spent, groceries bought, health care paid for, general appliances cashed out, and maybe a little tucked away for savings or a rainy day — why then, why is there still not much left? Most jobs are 40 hours a week, then another two hours in transportation time, so that's 10 hours a day, leaving between 4-5 hours left a day for life outside of sleeping and working. We're killing ourselves to get jobs that don't pay and steal our time. Our. Precious. Valuable. Time. Check out the October issue of Ode Magazine when it comes out for a peak into what a NYC schoolteacher thinks of the education institution post teaching days. I also put together a Q&A with the teacher to be put on the Web as well.

For those students graduating from high school, please head onto college, but know that even that won't be enough to get you the white picket fence, the brick house, the good neighborhood, the nice clothes. It will only get you average, and when you think of average, think nothing special. As individuals we need to think of ways to be special, to get what we want, but not at the expense of someone else. We need to be more conscious in our actions, and please, don't reward the status quo. That's a surefire way of rewarding no one.

"Everyone's special, Dash."
"Which is another way of saying no one is."
-The Incredibles

Classrooms to Social Class

So, I've often heard it said that life goes in cycles, but I never really believed it to be true.

Now that I seem to have loads of time on my hands, which for anyone who knows me in the slightest knows I do not enjoy, I've used some of it to reflect. [I'm more of a busy body who detests the silence, and revels in the quick-witted world of journalism.] Honestly, at this point I have no choice but to reflect.

You see, jobs are scarce. And yes, I am capable. Yes, I am intelligent. And yes, of course, I can deliver a beautifully crafted 500-5000+ word story for a vast readership. But no. There is no opportunity for that. I get it. I know I can't simply call up my buddy Sam Zell and actually receive a job chalk full of benefits and a company car. I knew that when I signed on as a journalism major, applied to the School, and subsequently graduated with honors. But this whole cycle business -- well, isn't it about time for it to cycle some more? I'm not advocating a mass withdrawal of babyboomers from the jobs that I desire to be mine, but I am advocating for some sort of position open specifically to post-students like myself, and not just one here and there.

Capable. Talented. Intelligent. And really, someone who is unwilling to ditch her dreams to become another desk-riding worker in some office somewhere. It's not even so much the dream of becoming a reputable reporter, but in all honesty, that's what I am trained to be. This is what I paid for, with not only money, but effort and long hours writing, reporting and studying.

As has become obvious with the Bush administration and multiple media outlets finally calling the "subtle beginnings" of what "may be" a recession, it is clear there are going to be a lot of layoffs and much more of what's already started in the job market. However, there should always be room for talented, hardworking people.

I am not living in a dream world -- unless I believed everyone is capable of attaining the American Dream, which I don't subscribe to. Failure happens. Social Mobility happens. Success happens.

The President has used the influx of students released from universities out into the disappearing workforce as a scapegoat for why jobs are seemingly evaporating into thin air, with all this summer heat around, and what not. But I do not buy it. The work force cycles, comes in waves just as everything else, but it probably won't go back this time. Not to how it used to be. We're living in a global economy. Jobs are outsourced, and it's more than just Qwest Internet connections forwarded to India. It's everywhere.

But where is journalism in all this? Should we be effected the same way? It's all that Internet, right? It's newspapers slashing newsrooms 19% like the Chicago Sun-Times. "It's competitive," they say. Or at least they say after we've walked out of the classroom for the last time.

Buckle Up for Safety

I've seriously got to buckle down and figure out the days before me. I need a job. A real one. Not just some side adventure in retail. I need one which involves dental and a health plan, something I love would be great. But really, I just want to go something worth while that also utilizes all of my attributes to the best of their ability. I'm having a difficult time feeling optimistic, but that's that. There's no choice in the matter. I need to find a career.

jobs

what i hate about jobs is not the actual applying, getting, working---no, it's much more than that. it's annoying that i have to

1. apply to more than one place and

2. the ones that i only sort of want to get, i get, and the ones i get maybe later if at all, are then pushed away because i already have the other one.

i dont like that i have to choose among jobs after applying many places. i would feel bad saying "yes" somewhere and then getting the better job later, and saying "yes" to them and then going to tell the other place "actually, just kidding" shrug. it's a difficult life. i wish i could just apply one place that i really want and they would give it to me. no questions asked.