Happy Father's Day

Thank you for teaching me how to put a minnow on a hook and a fish on a stringer.
Thank you for teaching me how to throw a ball and swing a bat.
Thank you for teaching me how to ride a bike and drive a car.
Thank you for teaching me how to carve a pumpkin and shoot a shotgun.
Thank you for teaching me how to use a lawnmower and a stick shift.
Thank you for teaching me how to backwash the filter and rescue a salamander.
Thank you for teaching me how to shuck oysters and make ice cream.
Thank you for teaching me how to play pool and gin rummy.
Thank you for teaching me how to dive off the diving board and go down the slide.
Thank you for teaching me the difference between a merganser and a canvasback.
Thank you for teaching me to love Glenn Miller and Tommy Dorsey.
Thank you for teaching me to "shake it off, sister."
Thank you for teaching me how to laugh and not to cry.

Thank you for showing me Mylie's Place and Mauna Lani.
Thank you for showing me Bequia and Grassy Butte.
Thank you for showing me Dead Moose Bay and Tigertail Beach.
Thank you for showing me whales and prairie dogs.
Thank you for showing me badlands and volcanoes.
Thank you for showing me manatees and those weird sheepshead fish with human teeth.
Thank you for showing me there are people who never yell or belittle.
Thank you for showing me there are people who are faithful and trustworthy.

Thank you for the swimming, ballet, piano, viola, voice, skiing and skating lessons. (Well, maybe not the skating lessons.)
Thank you for going to endless recitals and concerts.
Thank you for taking me to your office on Saturdays so I could play ping pong and drink Cokes while you worked.
Thank you for summer camp and canoe trips.
Thank you for letting me tag along to Divine's, Shinders, Parker Hanley, Sargent's, Gokey's, Burger Brothers, Baker Pool, Morey's, Alice Peterson's, Surdyk's, Dayton's, Bringgold's, Gabbert's, Kennys, Red's, Hudson's and anywhere else you happened to be going (and would have undoubtedly preferred to go alone because it would have been much faster).
Thank you for taking me to Vikings and Twins games.
Thank you for getting a puppy.
Thank you for fighting for our country.
Thank you for driving me to school when it was below zero.
Thank you for taking me to Olson Brothers for an ice cream cone after church.
Thank you for raucous 4th of July parties.
Thank you for helping me with math and accounting. (Well, maybe not the accounting.)
Thank you for my braces.
Thank you for bringing lefse and pickled pigs feet to Sunday School.
Thank you for taking me to the symphony.
Thank you for the Summit House and the houseboat.
Thank you for going to my son's baseball games.
Thank you for wearing lime green jackets and pink sport coats.
Thank you for being the epitōme of suāveness.
Thank you for taking care of me and my son.
Thank you for the only time in my life when I wasn't worried or afraid.
Thank you for loving me no matter what.
Thank you for always being happy to see me.

Thank you for putting your life on hold for Mom.
Thank you for never complaining.
Thank you for showing me what love and loyalty look like.
Thank you for dealing with your illness with dignity and humor.
Thank you for trying to hide your fear and sadness.
Thank you for wanting me by your side.
Thank you for giving me a purpose and making me feel important.
Thank you for being the father everyone wished they had.
Thank you for the best days of my life.

You will forever be greatly loved and missed.

Just the Facts

The unemployment rate in the United States was calculated at 9.1% as of May 2011. Unemployment is currently under-reported; even government officials admit their "adjustments" to unemployment figures are inaccurate during recessions. Economist John Williams puts the unemployment rate at 22.3%.

The average unemployed person has been looking for work for 39.7 weeks (9.5 months).  To add insult to injury, many of the unemployed who went back to school to be retrained for a new career have racked up student loan debt and are still unable to find a job.

Middle-aged workers (between the ages of 45-54) are the hardest hit.  While they should be in their prime earning years and at peak levels of expertise, they are the last to benefit from job recovery; losing out to cheaper employees who are either younger or older.

Most job openings in a company are filled without ever being posted.  Of the jobs that are posted, most will be filled internally and the resulting vacancies will be covered by distributing the workoad among current employees.  According to Forbes, as many as 90% of  jobs are obtained through casual connections; not via advertisement.  It is possible to apply for thousands of positions online and never receive a single response.

4.2 million mortgage borrowers are either seriously delinquent or have had their cases referred to lawyers to pursue foreclosure auctions, according to LPS Applied Analytics.  Of those, 2/3 have made no payments at all for at least a year, and 1/3 have gone more than two years.  Nationwide, it takes an average of 565 days to foreclose on borrowers in default from their first missed payment to the final auction.

Okay, admittedly these facts are depressing, yet I was so glad to find them!  They legitimize my experience - it isn't ME.  I realize that's of small comfort, but it's oddly comforting nonetheless.  (Misery loves company.)

Dad always said not to worry, things were bound to get better, just hang in there, everything's going to be alright.  I think he really believed it.  Hell, even I believed it!  He was so seldom wrong.  I wonder what he would say if he were here now. Probably the same thing - and I would want so desperately to believe him that I actually might.

The Hard Part

Okay, I think we've established becoming a career alcoholic doesn't appear to be a viable option for me.  What a pity; I think it's something I would have excelled at right up until the day I died of liver failure. (Living in a perpetual fog does have a certain appeal though, doesn't it?)

Now what? 

I have applied for jobs for which I'm overqualified.  I have applied for jobs for which I'm under-qualified.  I have applied for jobs for which I am eminently qualified. I have applied for permanent, temporary, full time and part time jobs.  I've applied for jobs near and far.  I've applied for jobs so far away that by the time I deduct the cost of gas I'd be working for $5.00/hour.

I've committed the potential employer's automated email response to memory.  It's always a variation of:
Thank you for your interest in the ABC position with XYZ Company.  Because we receive hundreds of applications for each position posted, we are unable to respond to every applicant personally.  If we determine your qualifications best meet our needs, you will be contacted by our Human Resources department. Good luck to you in your job search. 

Suffice to say I have never met their needs.  

Do they even read all the applications?  Would it help if I had a Facebook account so they know what I look like?  Should I include a photo on my resume?  Should I leave my son behind and move to North Dakota where there are hundreds of jobs begging to be filled?

I saw a news story about a woman who lost her home and is living in a van down by the river.  It immediately conjured up images of Chris Farley in a Saturday Night Live skit - the unemployed ne'er-do-well idiot living in the van down by the river. Suddenly it doesn't seem so funny.

That incredibly sad news story was followed by an incredibly ill-placed commercial where a man said life is meant to be enjoyed; not endured. What a lovely sentiment. What a bunch of crap.  

Sitting at the computer all day pulling up employment websites, filling out applications and tailoring resumes may seem like the proper thing to do under the circumstances, but I'm telling you, it sucks the life right out of you. Every job you don't get further destroys your confidence. EVERY JOB YOU DON'T GET, SOMEONE ELSE DOES.  Why???  What's wrong with me?  

You know what I need? I need a vacation.  Maybe I'll never have the kind of vacation where I see the ocean again or walk on a beach, but a vacation from failure would be nice.

The hard part is trying not to think about what's going to happen down the road. The hard part is maintaining a positive attitude; or at least faking one.  The hard part is pretending everything's going to be alright when I know it isn't.  The hard part is the realization that even if I get a job tomorrow it won't be enough to change the outcome.  The hard part is trying to figure out what I should do in preparation for the inevitable.  Sell everything?  Put the house on the market even though it's worth half the purchase price?  Walk away?  Squat?

The worst part is knowing my son will be a victim of my demise and see what a loser I am.

The best part is knowing my father won't.

The Morning After

I have a splitting headache and I feel like I'm going to puke.

This is a terrible disappointment. I'd intended to go to the liquor store this morning to buy a bottle of vodka so I could begin my regimen of excessive daily drinking. Now that's all shot to hell.  How ironic.  Instead of spending the day avoiding my dismal reality in the comfort of drug-induced euphoria, I find myself spending the day wallowing in my dismal reality in the discomfort of drug-induced emesis.

The best laid plans...

Slow Cooker

I was looking for my slow cooker.  I haven't used it in years, but I received a request for cocktail wieners wrapped in bacon covered with brown sugar.  (I know, I know...   But try to think of it as protein and carbohydrates as opposed to heart disease and diabetes.)

Anyway, I needed to find my slow cooker so I pulled a chair over to the cupboard, climbed up on the seat and peered into the dark recesses of the top shelf. Christmas napkins, birthday paper plates, a plethora of  old cups collected from various sporting events over the years (do we really need to keep a plastic Minnesota Wild cup from 2001 with all the writing completely rubbed off except for the L?  Well, I checked with my son and apparently we do), an assortment of vases for flowers I received decades ago (and yes, I know they're from decades ago because that's the last time I got flowers; and yes, I know it's pathetic that I bothered to keep them and move them with me every time I changed residences now that I think about it), and a bottle of wine.

What??? A bottle of wine? A BOTTLE OF WINE!  Eureka!!!  But wait. This is a bottle from two Christmases ago - could it possibly still be good?  (If you bought cheap wine, this is a question you'd have to ask yourself.)   Yes.  Yes, it's still good - the initial glass confirms it. The second glass immediately makes me more glib, clever, and entertaining than the first. (Granted, I don't actually have confirmation of this; it's simply a personal observation.)

My son comes home at 6:00pm and  asks incredulously, "Are you drinking wine?"   I instinctively go on the defensive: "Yes. Yes, it's wine. So what?" I don't drink by myself.  At least, I didn't until today. Now I understand why people do it. You feel happy - artificially, of course, but happy, nonetheless.  Is it any wonder people get drunk every night?  No, it's not.  (At this point we could delve into the reasons some sorry individuals are so miserable they find it necessary to self-medicate on a regular basis, but let's not. It would really harsh my buzz.)  Alcohol makes us feel good. Troubles melt away and we instantly become scintillating conversationalists and sages of wisdom. I have it on the finest authority.

I have a third glass. I'm on a roll.  (Hard to believe when I first opened the bottle I was fretting over how many days it would keep without being refrigerated; there's nothing worse than refrigerated red wine.  Fortunately now that wasn't going to be a problem.)

I have a fourth and fifth glass and finish off the bottle.

This is a brilliant new discovery.  I make a silent pact with myself to start drinking every night.  Hell, I'm unemployed; let's make it every day - all day!

Hold on.  I have the hiccups and my stomach doesn't feel so great. This is no good.

I want a new drug.

One that won't make me sick

One that won't make me crash my car

Or make me feel three feet thick

I want a new drug

One that won't hurt my head

One that won't make my mouth too dry

Or make my eyes too red.

I want a new drug

One that won't spill

One that don't cost too much

Or come in a pill

I want a new drug

One that won't go away

One that won't keep me up all night

One that won't make me sleep all day

I want a new drug 

One that does what it should 

One that won't make me feel too bad 

One that won't make me feel too good 

I want a new drug 

One with no doubt 

One that won't make me talk too much 

Or make my face break out 

______________

Clearly, after having consumed a bottle of wine, I have become a Grammy-winning lyricist. The words came to me as effortlessly as if I'd heard them a thousand times before.

This, however, pales in comparison to the earth-shattering revelations which occurred under the influence of cannabis many years ago. I know this for a fact because I still have the matchbook to prove it.  At the time, I was standing in the center of a hazy room filled with people in various states of altered consciousness. It was completely quiet.  I held an imaginary baton in my hand and began directing with the dramatic, fluid, sweeping, graceful motions of Toscanini.  Those who were awake were absolutely mesmerized; staring at me in wonderment and awe (or perhaps in a confused stupor - it's hard to say).  You could have heard a pin drop. This spellbinding air ballet went on uninterrupted for at least ten minutes (or perhaps it was only thirty seconds - it's hard to say).  Recognizing a magical moment when I saw one (if I do say so myself) the incident was forever preserved on a matchbook cover upon which I scribbled the profound words: I was conducting the silence.

Sheer genius.

(Just out of curiosity, how is it that I can remember that night like it was yesterday, when I can't remember yesterday?)

Sadly, the pure joy of that idyllic evening was soon shattered by the unfortunate event which followed. We ordered a pizza and thirty minutes later when the sound of the doorbell suddenly pierced the tranquility of our bucolic bubble, I panicked and in a moment of utter paranoia flushed all the pot down the toilet.  "What?  It was just the pizza delivery guy?  Oh, geez.  Sorry."  It could happen to anyone.

Then of course there were the cocaine aficionados. They rarely came up with anything intelligent or life-altering or important to say (even though they talked incessantly) and they seemed to spend an inordinate amount of time discussing when, where, and how to get more cocaine.  They did, however, do everything fast. I guess there's something to be said for that.

P.S.  Totally forgot about the slow cooker.  Made spaghetti instead.