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| It seems as though no one comes to Xanga anymore. The community it once was no longer exists and checking the site for updates is like looking for life after a nuclear blast. And so this is where it ends. I continue to journal at Live Journal and MySpace...Goodbye, Goodnight.
Infiniti_EI
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| I turned in my store keys today at around 4:37 p.m. today. I said a casual final goodbye to my now ex-manager Brian. I rode the escalator to the second floor of the Mall at Tuttle Crossing for the last time with my co-worker Michael Radich. Radich will return to work tomorrow. I will not.
The day I decided to take Voluntary Separation Pay was the same day our District Manager informed us that we all had jobs. I was at the LC Pavilion seeing Jack's Mannequin rock out when I got the message from my fellow Lead Consultant telling me where we were going to be placed. I had made up my mind earlier that day, but I hadn't told Brian just yet. But after knowning my job was secure, I knew I needed to unhinge it and let it fall to the ground. I texted Brian and he informed my DM. That was that.
It feels strange to be without a job and yet secure. For the next two and a half months, it will be like I am at work, but I won't have to wake up at a certain time. I don't have to do anything except, maybe, search for a new job. Most people want this, but it bugs me for some reason. I remeber when I quit my manager position at Moe's Southwest Grill very abruptly, I was depressed after three or four weeks without a job. I don't want to feel like that again. Before I even decided to take VSP, I started looking for a new job.
But with the looming certainty of worthlessness fast approaching, the question is why did I take VSP. I took it for the possible financial pay off. The possiblity of finding another job and having dual incomes. I could pay off a massive amount of debt and maybe find a job even more profitable than Sprint. And more than anything else, I needed time away. I loved Sprint, even as an ex-employee, but there was something about that bothered me...that stung me. Maybe it would have been alleviated with the change of stores. I don't know. But Sprint and I needed a break.
No is the time for uncertainty. The only thing I have set is working out and band practice. Monday Movie Night and Schwasted Saturdays will continue as planned. I am going to continue to write my short stories and music. I almost planned another great escape hitting up friends in NYC, DC, and Raleigh N.C. But a certain call interrupted that.
My interview is Monday...wish me luck. | | |
| One week ago, we learned that our Sprint Store inside the Mall at Tuttle Crossing would be going dark. It was bound to happen in a way…there is another Sprint Corporate store right across the street. We learned a week ago, but it seemed like everyone else (Sprint reps at other stores and districts, manufacturer reps, and even the Verizon Kiosk across from us) knew well before we did. Disappointed…embarrassed…hurt to find out the entire neighborhood knows of what goes on inside your house. More difficult to explain to the newcomers was why we weren’t the first notified since the decision affected us the most. I didn’t even try to come up with a reason. I’ve stopped trying to figure out why middle management does the things it does.
It felt like a bad breakup. Our store hasn’t done well in quite some time, but I had a renewed hope that we could push our store back in the green. But the speech of our store closing came before I could open my mouth. No “let’s try and work it out” or “if you can’t change then we can’t be together.” It was like I came home one day and everything was in boxes with a note left on the refrigerator. But that’s how it works.
But the breakup wasn’t enough…stories just kept changing. We were first told our jobs were safe, only to be told a few days later our jobs were not guaranteed. Budd and I would probably have to be demoted from a Lead Consultants to reps, but titles didn’t bother me much. We were told after a quick interview with each of the managers, we’d know whether we’d continue to work with Sprint or if we would be forced to take severance. Although it was more likely than not we’d all keep our jobs, we still threw around bets on who’d get placed where and who’d get canned. A way of keeping our spirits up, I guess. Now, it is a week later and the four of us are still in limbo.
In the event I am laid off…I am going to make another great escape.
Sprint isn’t such a harsh lover that it will give you a two week deadline to get your shit out of its house. Not at all. If Sprint cannot accommodate us in its life, it will give some support for a bit of time. Since Sprint and I have been exclusive for two years, it will give me eight weeks of regular play, plus four more weeks for the time we’ve been together. It will also give me full commission, $1,000, and pay me for any vacation time I have accrued this year. My health benefits will keep going for that amount of time as well.
Sallie Mae would have to wait. I’d pack up my car with clothes and gummi candy. I’d call Sarah, Darrell, Paul…and anyone else I knew on the East Coast. I’d visit each of them. Sarah would be first. I can’t see New York without thinking of the fun she and I had in the bitter cold. This time, it won’t be so bitter. The Daily Show, The Colbert Report, Broadway, and just hearing her in person instead of over iChat. From there I’d see Darrell in DC. I haven’t been there since 8th grade. I get to see the kid who beat me for a $25,000 scholarship. From there goes a venture into the unknown. Paul is a guy that I worked one shift with at the dorms my freshman year, but somehow he and I became friends. He gave me a great escape a few years ago…went out…got trashed all over Cleveland. Now he lives in Raleigh, N.C. a place I’ve never been, but has been touted on every single list I’ve seen for “Best City to Live In.” I’d take a repeat. Along the way, I want to venture off the interstate and see some small towns…let’s face it…I don’t have a time limit.
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| It was the last time I was going to see Sarah before she made her way to the Eastern Skies for her first year at Columbia University as a grad student. After what turned out to be a couple hours of new realizations and old habits (painting my nails black for one last time). Before we said farewell to each other, I told her not to get boggled down in the city or her work. I told her to take some time to do what she likes…to be a dork…to read her comics, and graphic novels. To listen to music and play video games. To make some time for herself that isn’t filled with the world around her. Who knew, I wouldn’t be following my own advice.
Lately, I’ve been tackling that same daunting task that I challenged her to. Don’t get me wrong, there are some obligations that I enjoy immensely. But in the end, they are just that: obligations. Things that I must do with very little choice in the matter. Besides masturbation, I find myself drawing a line from one dot to the next with no regard to the spaces in between. And week after week, the dots have been looking too much like each other.
Last week, I prayed to God and apologized to him for the time I was wasting. Yes, the dots have to be connected, but the space between those dots belong to no one, but me. I own that space and it should not be an extension of my obligations. So, now I am making conscious efforts to make small squiggles…or big ones depending on how much room I have. I’ve gone back to playing some of the games I used to enjoy in college, such as the very frightening Doom 3 or the intriguing Max Payne. Netflix, something I’ve had since Freshmen year, has been used very little in the past few…months. In fact, one of the movies, I’ve had since September. So, I’ve been making conscious efforts to watch those movies in the free time I have and not deviate from it. I watched “The Devil Wears Prada” today. Set in New York, it reminded me of Sarah. She’s starting to turn into that city for me. It suits her. Sometimes I make up my own dots. We’ve made a few nights. Movie night is Monday and we either go out to the movies or stay in and rent one. Wednesday is Trivia Night at Ledo’s Bar. Sometimes, I just take Ashland for a walk. My favorite dots are on the weekend when we all go out to listen to music and drink. My friends, my friends, my friends. If they only knew how much that time means to me. How much those hours help me get through the week. Last week was the best.
These are baby steps though. Right now, it’s as if those dots have atmospheres that touch one another. So even though I own the space in between, the reminder of the next one is still there. But slowly, those dots will be only that.
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| I went on a music downloading binge this morning. Ever since iTunes enhanced the bitrate quality of their music selection beyond even my standard, I’ve turned away from buying physical CD’s and just pushing a button. This morning, I complete depleted the $50 gift card for iTunes I once had. But in my library, I now have albums that are worth so much more.
Call it the change in weather, but I needed some new music. Something that makes me want to roll down the windows of my car while I cruise on the freeway. But I still wanted rock. It seems like so many bands want to venture towards this dance rock craze that has been invading my music scene. With auto-tune in hand, they go on to make these groovy jams that have absolutely no soul about them. Well, some do, most don’t. They are created to make the little high school girls in the crowd move their hips, but not their minds. Maybe I’m old. I just don’t care for it…
Call me nostalgic. I’ve been in dire need of some of the music that got me into this scene. Sure, I can listen to some of those band right now, but I needed some kind of proof that the music I love is still being created and isn’t lost in the clouds of my memory or the pages of Wikipedia. Plus, a good number of those bands are broken up, evolved, or simply fallen into the dance rock crap. The first place I turned to were the bands that broke up and are doing other things. I saw one of This Day & Age’s last shows and when their lead singer left, they continued as The Reign of Kindo. The music is just as delicious as the previous work. Then came The Early November, a band that I look up to in so many ways even though they don’t exist anymore. I finally bought their last album. The band Acceptance broke up years ago, but it spawned Search/Rescue, a band less aggressive, but powerful and melodic. Of course, I’ve purchased music from bands from the total unknown like J Minus, who has been on my most plays on Last.fm for the past week or so.
As much as this music is an absolute pleasure to listen to, it is also fuel for me. I’ve noticed since my band’s last album released, my writing has changed a bit. My fingers are beginning to realize there can be no throwaway lyric and everything has to count. The last two songs I wrote involve a man conversing with his own psyche and almost getting in a mental battle with himself. Both have their own voices and so I don’t sing the entire song. Revolutionary, no. But I am starting to realize what artists have to do to get to that point.
I can’t wait for Spring. Sans the allergies, I can’t wait to drive with my windows down again. That’s my favorite time of day, when I am alone in my car with my music.
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