dream books

when I took the medication to sleep,

I think I dreamed of a book series

never written yet outside my dreams,

and I awoke wanting desperately

to re-read it in the waking world

when living in the darkness

She talks about how there is no
faith tradition for evangelicals
to follow in the times when one
is living in the dark.  True.
Disciplines and rituals aren't
for evangelicals.  Emotions are more
important and true than
"smells and bells", and where
does that leave those
deep in dark depression
who feel
nothing?
Nowhere
alone.
False.  This
is why it's important to tell true stories
of our times in the darkness,
for truth is light and hope, and hope
in the midst of darkness is
sometimes the only
gift of love we
can give
each other.

Something I heard late one night

I didn't actually see anything.  I just heard it:  the crunching squeal of tires skidding on ice over and over for half a minute in the parking lot, the skid, the crash of a significant impact between two cars, the sound of something glass shattering, the brief silence, more glass falling, the engine gunning, more skidding, and a fishtailing journey out of the icy parking lot and away down the street at something significantly over the speed limit.  Why?

I thought about calling the police.  I didn't because, well, what can they do when you report hearing a crime?  I wondered if I should tell the apartment manager in case the poor person whose parked car got smashed into needed someone to back up their claim to the insurance company that they were a victim and not responsible for the damages.  But I didn't SEE it, and the insurance company would still have to pay for it unless the criminal was caught, which would not happen based on my testimony.

In the end, I said nothing and told no one and was very glad I pay extra to have a garage stall to park in at night.  I do that because I can't dig my car out of the snow and/or ice, but apparently it's also handy against random acts of pointless, stupid vehicular vandalism.  Yes, Mom, my insurance rates did go down when I moved here.  I can't really imagine why . . .

Treasuring the waiting

In the past when I've done job interviews, I've generally had a good time, and so have the interviewers.  Then they feel awful when they can't hire me.  They call me on the phone and just sound wretched about how they liked me best, but they have to hire this horrible person with ten years more experience.  That will probably happen this time, too, which makes me sad.

My favorite story about that was this time I interviewed for an internship at a big company, got that exact phone call, and later, when I was at the annual conference for my professional organization, they saw me from across the room and very non-subtly tried to stay on the far side of the room from me during the entire reception.  It was kind of flattering and mostly hilarious.  Eventually, I actually bumped into one of them (totally by accident), and she just looked mortally embarrassed, like she wanted to grovel and beg my forgiveness for not hiring me.  "We all really wanted to work with you," she said mournfully.  "We were so sorry they wouldn't let us have you."

That made two of us.  Soft skills being more valuable than hard skills my ear.  It all worked out later during the conference when I finally managed to secure a kind of crappy internship at a small company where micromanagement was not a problem, and I got to make a website from scratch all by myself.  It was located near where my older sister lived, so I was also able to live with and make awkward attempts to connect with my sort-of-estranged older sister the summer before she got married.

I wonder if the people I interviewed with will be that disappointed if they don't hire me this time.  I almost brought one of them to tears just during the interview.  (Accidentally, I swear; I was just wrapped up in this one story I was telling that had a kind of sweet ending, and I got a tad emotional, and is it a good sign if they say, "That was a really nice story" and "I had no idea what we were going to talk about for an hour, but the time just  went past and was over" at a big corporate job interview?)  I'll certainly cry if I don't get the job, but we'll burn that bridge if we come to it.

I thought I'd already learned the lesson about how sometimes your best isn't good enough, but I still don't want to learn it again.  I'm kind of treasuring the waiting right now because not knowing NO is better than knowing it.

Ever been in that situation: where the waiting is painful but still seems better than finding out for sure that you've failed?

The Joy of Retail: 7 memorable moments at my RetailEstablishment

I've worked full time at RetailEstablishment for the last 5 years. I've stayed with it because, frankly, I'm crippled and can't get any better paying, less crazy-making jobs. If I could type and file and lift and carry and such, I don't think I would have lasted this long, but since I can't (and since the government has said, "Screw you," about my disability), I had to stay with retail while getting more hurt and taking out huge loans to get a degree I could use to get a teaching job (in theory).

The following events actually happened at my RetailEstablishment:

• A homeless man ate a customer's food while the customer was at the counter getting some water.
• Someone pooped in an aisle on the second floor.
• A pair of obviously used children's underwear was left at the information desk.
• A man entered the store and began singing, swearing, and eventually screaming at the top of his very healthy lungs like a tornado siren for over a minute in the vestibule.
• A man obviously not in right mind entered the store, threatened customers and employees, and eventually knocked over a huge, heavy display upstairs in rage. There was glass on the display. Luckily, no one was cut.
• A man walked into the men's room, shed his clothes, and laid on the floor.
• A man snuck into the handicapped stall in the ladies' room and peeped under the divider at a customer.

(This list does not include all of the screaming, swearing, threatening repeat offenders caught shoplifting or trying to hustle money from customers.)

I think every United States citizen should have to work a 2 year stint in retail, like the South Korean military or maybe more like the 2 years of service Mormons complete. If this enforced retail experience happened, I'd like to believe that the retail world would be a better place because customers would know how hellish they can make life for retail employees, and they would not want to make the employees' lives more miserable. In gratitude, retail employees would go even more out of their way to serve their customers pleasantly, efficiently, and happily. I believe no one should be allowed to be in management or corporate management without four solid years of this experience. I'm a dreamer, I know.

Norm Feuti is a genius. You should read his Pretending You Care: a Retail Handbook if any of the following apply:

• You work(ed) retail and want to know it's just as crazy elsewhere.
• You are considering working in retail, and you think it sounds like great fun.
  
• You have ever shopped in a retail store where people work.
• You will ever shop in a retail store where people work.
• You've been treated "badly" by a retail employee and want to know what could lead them to do that to you.
• You are in management, and you don't hate your employees and you actually want to make their jobs easier and their lives better, so they can be more efficient and productive and better at their jobs.

The book is hilarious. I hurt myself laughing. More than once. Not only is it full of well-organized lists (such as the kinds of employees you'll work with and the kinds of customers you'll interact with), it's also full of Feuti's syndicated comic strip "Retail." It's spot on. I'd say about 85% of this book is common to every retail establishment in the U.S. I'm glad the other 15% doesn't apply to my store. Who wouldn't want a glamorous life in retail? (For the record, we don't have a rooftop place like Cooper. Sigh.)

Anyone have any of your own stories to share?