Jeremiad

Posted on September 4, 2002 in IRC/Chat Social Justice

“O God that madest this beautiful earth, when will it be ready to receive Thy saints? How long, O Lord, how long?”

George Bernard Shaw
St. Joan

A sarcastic remark about our “wonderful economy” at Dalnet #politics (where else do I go?) led me to a private conversation with a fellow who has been out of work for eight months. He’s a software engineer by trade, married, and two weeks shy of seeing a new baby arrive in his home. He’s been reduced to a scheme:

I am going to propose to a company that I work there for free…. After 3-6 months, I will ask if they want to pay me….Otherwise, I will begin looking for work again, leveraging my new experience.

I wish him luck.

I haven’t worked, except for occasional commissions, since 1992 — due to illness and outright disgust with working conditions. So many good people have lost their jobs. Every day I dread that the Empress is going to come home with the news that her company has closed its doors. I feel terrible that I don’t bring in any money of consequence, but she assures me that all is well — perhaps to avoid pitching me into a panic attack but most likely because she is competent and a genuine asset to her company.

I follow the lives of many bloggers who describe being out of work in this wonderful economy. Red Water Lily, for one writes of an interview she had with a head hunter who told her that even though the market is an absolute shambles that she thinks RWL will find a job soon. She ends her blog with Brian McKnight’s song “Win”. Doubtless she believes that there is some magic in repeating the words, if not in bringing her a job then in helping her keep the faith as she looks.

Another blogger, Kat, put up a Paypal donation button to help her make ends meet while she waits for her first paycheck. Yes, all is right in America as we throw billions into preparations for bombing Iraq and let the widows and orphans resort to begging and vague promises to stay alive.

I know, if only for their sake, that I, too, should keep the faith. But after a young adult hood offending people in pretty much the same ways that Shaw’s Saint Joan did, I find it hard to give credit to the voices speaking through my imagination. Except for those who suggest that the road is long, hard, and uncertain or that it is nigh impossible to get those with power to admit that things are a mess.