Of Axes and Impossibilities

This post wrote itself.  Not literally, of course.  I, me, the person who is at the keyboard did the work.  The central idea, however, was ready made.

I was let go from my job today.

Third time in three years.  I must say, it is a song and dance I am mighty sick of doing.  The timing is never good, but it is absolutely horrible for me right here and now.  I am quite short in a key resource, and the steady paycheck was necessity not nicety; no fat margins for me.  Hell, no real margin at all.

I say "was".  Reality? It is a necessity, a fact driven home to me when I sat down to take stock.  The stock, sad to say, was a bit thin.

So.

I don't know what the next step may be.  I've been an architect all of my adult life.  This is the sixth time in that span that I have been laid off.  You might think the universe is trying to tell me something.  The problem, the crux of this dilemma, is that I really don't know what to do next.

That's a hell of a thing for someone who is trained as a professional problem solver.

So.

Where now?  And did you know that, coincidentally, I began blogging three years and a day ago?  Interesting.  Trivial.  Useless, maybe, as a fact.  But interesting.

So.

Where do I go now?  I don't know.  I just don't know.  I'm fleeing axefalls and running headlong into impossibilities.  It's going to take some magic.

Cattle Dislike It, Too

Branding. Brand yourself. What is the brand that is "you"?

It is a simple question, on the surface. It gave me pause, but only after the seminar was over. The afternoon was spent in consultation with 49 of my peers, trying to define our individual brands. When I say peers, I mean other people "between employments", as the current language calls our joblessness.

As an aside, I feel the same way about that phrase as I do about calling a used car "previously owned": plus ungood.

Anyway, it was a group of us professionals who are unemployed or between jobs or making career transitions, and we were each a mini-corporation trying to define an image. Just like Nike, Coca-Cola or any other company that has some sort of iconic touchstone.

There was a lot of creative energy in the room, tinged a bit with puzzlement and the faintest whiff of cynicism. I managed to set aside most of my weariness and skepticism to dive in to the best of my ability. Believe it or not, I even engaged in some public speaking. Most of the time I avoid public speaking like I would avoid an aerosolized tankful of medical waste. Which is to say, I would run away as quickly as possible while holding my breath.

There was the typical small group exercise, which I did enjoy. It was fun to connect with people, tap into their ideas and energy and share thoughts on what we think we are, what we want to be. We all made lists of descriptive words and then tried to come up with a tag line* whereby potential employers or clients would recognize us and what we can do for them. It was to be along the lines of "Good to the last drop" or "Just Do It", but connecting the Brand (me) with the Client (employer) base. Fun and games, folks, but something happened to me on the drive home that really threw me into the weeds. As usual, it involved music.

I became aware that I don't know me.**

The trigger was "The Sweet Part of the City" by The Hold Steady. The song came on, I was daydreaming a little, and the slide guitar in the song is killer. Craig Finn isn't singing about being unemployed, but the lyrics combined with that guitar really hit me hard. I suddenly felt terribly alone, and weightless. I saw myself sitting on a derelict dock down at harbor, sunlight glinting on railroad tracks behind me. Just me and the gulls and gravel, and I'm crooning to the ocean. The sun is going down, as it should be. For reasons unknown, I started thinking about my brother, and how much I miss him. I wept.

The weight of worthlessness and isolation came crashing down on me. Trying to drive while figuring out who I am, or who I was, or who I am supposed to be...I couldn't do it. If I had been on a road trip, that would have been the time to pull the car over, kill the engine and go to sleep in the back seat. I was very close to home, as it was, so I did the next best thing. I parked the car at the curb, wiped my face and headed inside to collapse on the couch. My hands could barely support the weight of my head.

The essence of Me made marketable, employable...and I don't really know it anymore. Maybe I never did. The things that I was may not be the things I am, or need to be. Reconciliation of all the threads in this frayed rope of a life is slipping through some weary fingers. I can call myself all sorts of names, pile on the keywords and the adjectives...but now? None of it seems to fit, and that hurts.

Branding. Ask the cattle how they feel about being marked with a red-hot iron. Ask them if it is necessary.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: I am in no way affiliated with mp3bounce(dot)com, no compensation or endorsement was received, given or implied. Typical YouTube shenanigans...it was the best I could get for the song, the name just happened to be on the video. I am also not a paid spokesman for The Hold Steady...but I can say THS makes some awesome music.

*I won't reveal mine...yet. I'm too self-conscious, and I'm still working on it.
**Yes, its been said before. Yes, its a cliche. It also happens to be the Truth.

Real World is Hungry

"When you start to doubt yourself, the real world will eat you alive" - Henry Rollins, "Shine"

I understand the hunger of the real world. It paces me, follows me like my own shadow. I have had many a conversation with it, in grimy diners and noisy machine rooms. The hunger never seems to be rattled, and never seems to sit still. Even motionless, the edges of it blur. I gave up long ago on rubbing my eyes, or focusing. But that makes my head hurt, and now I have no idea what to do.

No. No. That isn't quite true. The back of my mind knows what to do. The front of my mind has so far resisted making the adjustments necessary to sharpen the picture.

Then, today, I heard something I really needed to hear, but no one who could say it to me.

It's hero time.

Beach Glass

For all that the waves roll in, it is so quiet here. You know that? I do. This silence, or vacuum or what-shall-we-call-it...neglect is too strong a word. It comes close, and I would find another word, but I'm tired and too lazy to get off the couch and get my thesaurus.

I have left this garden untended for what seems a long time. I see the link for it on my computer screen, but lately I have rarely felt the motivation to click on it. This is for a lot of reasons, foremost of which I have felt little in the way of needing to write.

It is true: I haven't felt like writing. This is a disturbing state of affairs, for me.

The flow of ideas has lessened a little, but is still there. I have not managed to put them to paper (or electrons). It is not writer's block, so much as a problem of mojo.

My mojo hath fled. It didn't storm out of the house, cursing and flipping me the bird, to drive off in a screech of tires and haze of dust. No, it faded away like a slow leak in the tires. I knew something was going on because I could hear that funny noise in my head, akin to the one that tires low on pressure make when driving at highway speeds. WahWahWahWahWah...My solution was to turn up the radio and keep driving, hoping nothing else would go wrong.

All of this came back to me this evening as I strolled through my new neighborhood. I had that "wellhowdidIgethere?" moment again. Past flowerbeds and streetlights and lawn furniture and mailboxes...I was overcome with lassitude. I would have said ennui, but I don't know if I was bored, exactly, as part of all this non-feeling.

Non-feeling. Not as in numb, but as in an absence of feeling. I was tired, under the weight of loneliness and anxiety, probably brought on by job-hunting activities which had absorbed my afternoon and early evening. There came a point where I decided on the walk as a self-defense measure. Unplug, disconnect, not think, just do.

It all came back to me in a rush as I returned home, and it was the fault of the mailbox. My mailbox is mounted on a post. The post, in turn is embedded in a large flower pot, more like a small barrel. As I paused at the gate, I looked over at the mailbox and it hit me that I have been in my new house for nearly two months...and I have not yet changed the name on the sides to mine.

I stood there in a daze, not outwardly seeming any different. Inside, however, I felt myself collapse a little, hollowed out by all the losses I have incurred in the past months. Job. Marriage. Friendship. Brother. Money. Money. Job (again). Peace of mind. I thought back to the resume and small portfolio I had sent out earlier, how much it took out of me to do it.

I never, ever thought I would be saying anything like what went through my head at that moment: I'm getting too old for this crap. And I am. Chronologically, most folks would say I am in mid-life, and would say that perhaps the best is yet to come. I hope so.

Standing there with my hand on the gate, feeling dizzy and tired, I knew it in my bones. I am getting too old for this crap. I lack the energy and naivete of my younger self, and reality has been too dynamic. The Year of the Tiger is taking the starch out of me, and subsequently taking the starch out of my writing. The Tiger is feasting on my mojo.

If life is a beach, as the slogan says, then I am glass tumbling in the surf. Pounded and abraded, never resting, I roll back and forth in the water. I can only hope that loving hands will pick me up and take me home, to be turned into art. If not a work of art, then at least placed in a sturdy bowl with the other beach glass, the iridescent fragments of a fractured life.

Jacked Of All Trades

I finally have been getting around to laying some comments on other blogs near and dear to the Gumbo ticker, playing a furious game of catch up (which I’ll probably lose), and I just finished reading the latest brain fireworks from Jeff at GoodFatherBlog.com. The unsinkable GoodFather, like yours truly, was laid off late last year (we’re siblings in that respect, you could say) and has a few things to say about the state of that union. Please do give him a visit and lay down some luv, you won’t regret it. Sure it’s not exactly a feel-good topic, but Jeff pulls it all together with some of that cool GF humor. Speaking of humor, it brought to mind this really good joke, hope you like it:

(Phone rings. I nearly sprain an ankle leaping to answer)
Me: Hello, Irish Gumbo* speaking.
Voice: Irish, this is Sparky McDinglefritts** with Gobsmack Placement Services, returning your call from yesterday, about the job reference and openings.
Me (excited): Wonderful! Thanks for the return call. So, what do we have?
Sparky: Well, I have two positions with AtlasRoarkRand Architects***, requiring at least 15 years experience…
Me (wetting self): Yes! I have about 19 years of experience!
Sparky: ...as a Director of Operations or Senior Planner, sort of a “rainmaker” position concentrated in health care projects.
Me (sound of balloon deflating): Um, no, my experience is spread out over a lot of different project types.
Sparky: Ohh…(pause)…most of our clients come to us with very specific requirements.
Me (mouthing ‘shitshitshitshit’): Oh, I see.
Sparky: Yeah, the ‘jack-of-all-trades’ types generally have a harder time getting offers.

HAAAHAAA! WOOOooOOO! HAAA! Oh, Sparky, stop it ya killin’ me (wiping eyes) BWAAHHAAAHHAAH (gasp) HAAH (hic)HAA(hic)…See what you (hic) did, now I’ve (hic) got the (hic)cups! Oh, jay-zus, I gotta sit down (fans face) wooo, hep me, hep me! Oh, snap!

What, you don’t get it? See, there’s ‘jack-of-all-trades’…harder to hire…I’m a jack of all…and that means I…job…oh, never mind. I guess it isn’t as funny if you have to explain it. (sigh) Wow. That’s a wicked pissah! I am astounded that I have as much experience as I do and yet am now somehow harder to hire. Does this make sense? Does this mean that after all these years of taking the jobs I could get, learning as much as I could and trying to cover all my bases, that I am less attractive to employers looking for experience? Man, what a mess.

In another little twist (is that the hot metal tang of irony I smell?) to this tale of woe, I do have something approaching a specialization in architecture: a concentration in churches. That’s right, peoples, churches. O, sweet lawd, can you dig it? The snag is that even in the best of economic times, that sort of work is not as widespread or as financially secure as a lot of other types of projects, such as health care. The current crunch has everybody by the short and curlies, so when even the mo’ money types like hospitals, schools and the like are cutting back, church work is definitely not on the table.

So what to do? It is a bit discouraging to strive to be a Renaissance man**** when what the world wants are encyclopedias devoted to one subject. Architectin’ is the biggest skill set I have; reasonably certain I am overqualified to be a paperboy (I was a paperboy for 5 years) or a groundskeeper (briefly, one summer) or a shop gopher (one summer). Say, does anyone have any ideas? Anyone? I don’t know, maybe I could give this writing thing a try…

*All names have been changed to protect the befuddled. Plus, I don’t want to get sued.

**See? Sparky? Who would name their kid Sparky, really!

*** Inside joke for architects. Sorry.

****Okay, I can’t play a lute. Nor can I use an astrolabe or read Greek. And I totally suck at fencing. But you get the idea.

Return To The Panic Hole

The Panic Hole. I have mentioned it before on this blog. And today I took a trip back there, unintended and involuntarily and completely necessary. Because if I hadn’t I think I may have started screaming and dived out my dining room window.

My dining room window is about ten to twelve feet off the ground. It would have hurt. Instead I got up and ran.

It happened about 10:30 this morning, as I sat at my computer making a heroic and painful effort to revise my resume. I had been at it for about two hours, and the going was tough. I didn’t expect it to be so difficult. How hard can it be to update what is basically a laundry list of where, what and when? Admittedly I haven’t seriously reworked my resume in almost (OH MY GOD) ten years; the last time in 2005 doesn’t count because I was going to work for a company for which I had previously worked. That was more like adding some notes in the margins.

The whole idea of reworking the resume had me antsy from the start. I was resisting, the hothead grouch in the back of my head kept screaming ‘I shouldn’t have to do this! Where the fuck did my job go?’ Shouting back wasn’t helping. I was cursing at some stubborn formatting issues that I could not resolve when my vision started to get a little wonky, like one of those dream sequence fade-ins on ‘The Brady Bunch’ or ‘Gilligan’s Island’. My heart started to race and I felt queasy-weak. The muscles in my arms and legs felt twitchy and leaden at the same time. Panic was setting in, so I got up and ran. I grabbed my iPod (I should just surgically attach it, it goes everywhere with me now. Except the toilet, and that may change.) put on my coat, scarf and hat and hotfooted it out of the house before I threw up or fainted. I jumped in my car and drove over to my nearest panic hole, a lake and park not too far from my house. It was reflex, pure and simple.

A cold day, pewter sky sprinkling a fine spray of sleet as I got out of the car and set out on a fast walk on the path around the lake. For some reason, I decided to not put on the headphones this time. It was quiet, well, PEOPLE quiet, and I wanted to minimize the man-made noises. What I needed was calm. My heart was still racing and my head was pounding. The air was chilly damp, but it didn’t seem to faze the birds and waterfowl. They were out in force. I rounded the second curve down by the lake and a bright scarlet cardinal flitted across the path right in front of me. The color was amazing against the backdrop of gray tree trunks and brown leaves. There was a flotilla of Canadian geese out on the water. They were honking softly, gliding over water like rippled glass. Something inside me began to unwind, a clock spring ticking over. I crossed the bridge at the west end of the lake. To my left, out on the water, I saw a cluster of smaller ducks. Diver ducks, maybe eiders or buffleheads. They resembled a school of fish in the way they were skittering around on the lake. I drew my first deep breath of the day. The cold air felt good way down in the bottom of my lungs. I felt another unloosening in my gut and the beginnings of a smile.

Climbing a small hill I make my way along the north shore of the lake. A steep embankment is to the left, lake to the right, the path at the bottom of a slope thick with trees. Bird chirps fill the air and form a nice counterpoint to the faint roar of a jet plane flying somewhere overhead. I startle a squirrel, which spasmodically scales a tree with a loud chittering noise. He rotates on the side of the tree and gives me the stinkeye. He swishes his tail in a gesture I think was meant to be menacing. I chuckle and apologize, assuring him I mean no harm. With a few wrinkles of his snout he scurries up the tree and out of sight.

Legs and arms are feeling loose, now that I have warmed up a bit. My breathing has stabilized. Air rushes in and out of my lungs, tasting faintly of snow and iron. Sleet is falling gently with a wonderful sizzling sound as it hits the leaves blanketing the ground. It reminds me of frying bacon, an impression strengthened by an unexpected faint whiff of wood smoke. I have fallen into a pleasant rhythm of swinging limbs and deep breaths. Sakes alive, it feels good to breathe so deep I can feel the tension drain away from my belly! Just like I was taught in my yoga classes from a few years ago. I can hear the voice of the instructor: ‘Remember to breathe, let it go, and breathe’. It is amazing that a simple thing like a loose diaphragm (no, not that kind!) can have such an incredible effect on feeling better.

Walkbreathewalkbreathewalkbreathe. I cross another bridge and enter the “Arboretum”, one of my favorite parts of the trail. The path wends its way on a gentle curve through a grove of tall, straight trees. No leaves at this time of the year. The trunks remind me of masts and the wood beams of the Lutheran church I attended as a child. Peace has worked its way through my skin and is working on the bones. The clock spring in my belly unwinds a bit more as I exit the cathedral and make my way towards the massive berm that forms the east end of the lake. The wind picks up because there are no trees to block it as it blows down the open water. A few bedraggled seagulls float in the water near the spillway. A few diver ducks are swimming in circles. Finally, I smile wide and laugh out loud on a deep lungful of wintery air. The gulls eye me with mild interest and then return to sulking in the wind.

My companions for the rest of this interlude in the panic hole are geese, two crows, and a lone canvasback duck. The duck was a surprise, I haven’t seen one at the lake until now. I raise my hand in greeting and the canvasback continues his slow glide over quicksilver wavelets. Time has slowed and whatever had me in its grip has let go. I am back to feeling human. My friend the blue heron is nowhere in sight, but that is okay. Maybe he, like me, took off for his panic hole. Heron, breathe with me.