An article in The New York Times Sunday found that nearly 240,000 American jobs disappeared from January to April and all those rejects (I use this term endearingly) don't know how to deal with the shame of it all with their friends and neighbors. Instead, they're staying in the house and away from soccer fields. But don't blame it all on them-- they say friends stopped calling, too!
This country has an amazing stigma about joblessness, one that supposes laziness and lack of ambition and something wrong with the person who can't keep a lame job. Okay, some people are exactly that. But not everyone. Ex-coworkers still have a hard time around me... I sense they're worried I'm depressed (no fun) or I'll ask them for a job. I guess it's not really their fault--In D.C., what more do you know about a person than what he or she does for work?
Some great advice - for both the jobless and the rest - was expressed by one man interviewed in the article: Put it out there, give friends a way to be useful if they want to, and stop feeling sorry for yourself or anyone else. I'll add: talk about something other than work, for godssake! Then it won't be so hard to be around your poor, sad, little jobless friend.
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4 comments:
Oh yea I know what you mean. I've taken time off from working and it's weird. I never realized how much people OBSESS about their status and work (especially in DC) and don't really have much else to say.
the worst thing is that after a few years in a DC job, you really don't have any life outside of it, they work you into a dependency, it's your only identity, that's how they trap you! Although I have a few friends who have figured out how to balance it. That's cool.
"In D.C., what more do you know about a person than what he or she does for work?"
That's pretty much the one thing I tend to forget about people. Unless you're something fun or different I'll probably forget that you're Director of some ethics committee or an assistant to a congressmen. I guess it's the luxury of being an admin person who has no real need for contacts in the city.
"Unless you're something fun or different I'll probably forget that you're Director of some ethics committee or an assistant to a congressmen."
awesome. that's how I was in seattle... I couldn't tell you what my friends did unless they worked with me. it's something a person can forget when the circle around us (the one we put ourselves in, of course) changes.
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