It's an ideal weather day here in White Plains: cold, rainy, and windy, with leaves tumbling down all over the roads. My favorite kind of day. Yeah, I know I'm not exactly in the majority on this opinion.But it's a good day to be exhausted, and not feeling 100%, and if I didn't have to be in the office today I'd be curled up with my friend Sally's book, with a pot of chili bubbling on the stove and maybe even a challah in the oven. One of my ambitions this year is to learn how to bake my own, even though technically, I suppose, I shouldn't be eating it.
As much as I'd love to cocoon up and forget about the world, I know it's not a realistic expectation. I can only be grateful for my easy job and the fact that it's insanely busy here - which brings great hope for surviving the recession. Sure, I'm not making nearly enough money, and every month is a struggle in spite of the two new dresses bought on sale, and the new shoes I have to occasionally buy for more than I've ever spent on shoes before, because they are really good for people with RA. Right now I'm grateful for my job, and for the apartment I can curl up in even though it's a freaking mess, and for the fact that I was never smart enough to go into the financial world.
When I graduated from college in '92, the economy sucked - not quite as badly as it does now - but it wasn't a good market for new graduates. On the strength of my summer job as a bank teller (which my dad arranged for me), I was accepted into a management training program at a small bank in Fleetwood, about a 20 minute drive from my parents' house.
That was an easy job too, but I hated it. I hated the branded uniformity of the environment, the stupid stock photos on the walls, the sense of confinement in the tiny branch, the strict 30 minute lunch break, having to wear a suit and stockings and heels every day, and the rotten attitudes of the veterans who thought all of the young people were idiots. Not to mention that the manager, a Mariah Carey fanatic, insisted on Muzak renditions of all her greatest hits, played incessantly over the branch sound system, all day. But above all, I hated the sense that this was it - this was the future - surrounded by people who cared about nothing but money. I had spent four years studying the literature of the Holocaust. My boyfriend was 2 hours away, in Philadelphia, cheating on me with anyone he could find. It was not a good time. But as people kept telling me, I had a job, and that was the important thing. I was miserable, but my parents explained it away - that was what the working world was all about - I would have to learn how to deal with it.
One night, I was over at my friend Meg's house - her parents were away so we were hanging out, drinking Coronas and peeling peaches for pie - in despair of my future and its bleak, conformist outlook. At around 4AM, in a haze of lime-scented alcohol and a pile of pie-crust trimmings, Meg convinced me to quit. I decided to table the decision for another couple of hours.
When I woke up at 8AM, the rain was pouring down - it was a day much like this one - with a wind tossing the leaves from the trees. I reached for the phone and called my boss to let him know that I wouldn't be coming in; that in fact, I wouldn't be coming back.
Needless to say, my parents weren't too happy with me. But it wasn't the right fit for me - it would never be the right fit no matter how many chances I gave it. It was only three weeks later that I landed a new job - an editorial proofreader at the Pennysaver, where I made even less money than I had as a management trainee. But it was full of creative people - cool young people in jeans and sneakers - where we got 45 minutes for lunch, and could blast whatever music we felt like playing. Sure, we had our fair amount of suits and crazies, but at least they were real. And best of all, there wasn't a hint of Mariah Carey to be heard.
I went from there to grad school, and then on to marketing, and now here we are, sixteen years after that rainy day hangover that helped me to move to a new path. Standing at the crossroads again, I can only wonder this time what the rain will bring.
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