The Substance Behind the Smoke

Houston, two days into mission and counting. Systems check Nominal. Clean burn, repeat, clean burn. Standing by on second attempt at first stage separation. Waiting for rollback pumps to clear, then will try again Houston.

Another day.
I work on reading emails and trying to get my case together. This is going to be one humdinger to lose. One of my arguments in my case, which I'm am listing in my outline, is that there are 15 prescribed substances, that I'm on, 4 of which are controlled. Each and every last one of them have side effects that make it difficult to be expected to get shit done every day. I'm getting good at it, well, that's until LUVOX came along and upset the applecart. Now my sleep patterns are still fucked up over that shit (But at least I got my goddamned MOJO back! Yeaaa Baby!)

I head out, going downstairs for breakfast, feeling pretty good, running into Snow White. You know the usual about her. She wants me to sign some more forms. No problem, I'll do that shit tomorrow. I'm not miserable today. That's a great thing. My WELBUTRIN must be doing its job today. Maybe my Karmic outlook is keeping me from being a gloomy bastid.

I have reason to be gloomy, but I can't find it here. Listening to what the other patients have to go through with their SRO's I'm glad that mine is the way that it is. I'm ecstatic about it even. Okay, it's assisted living. I have social workers and shrinks and people to make sure that I get out of my room to make my appointments, they check my room regularly just in case I have pictures of some celebrity posted all along my walls, an arsenal of handguns spread out under the mattress, and a map of the nearest schoolyard tatooed on my chest, and they make certain that I take my prescribed medication. It's all good. It's not an apartment complex by any stretch of the imagination though.

Okay, I have a view of an air condi- tioner, and beyond that, a brick wall which makes it really meaning- less to have a window there. They should have just closed the distance and pressed the wall up firmly against the window, what's the difference. You still get the same claustrophobic feeling as you did with it five yards away. Well at least I can get an air conditioner in it.

I go out for my hour's walk today, I get that done, and out of the way. An hour's walk was all that I could get in though. Well, it came out to be an hour and fifteen minutes. That's a lot of walking. I look at how much ground that I can cover in just ten minutes and I'm surprised that I don't walk all over this city. I got home not feeling too bad, and then I ran into this:

WASHINGTON – First-time claims for jobless benefits fell more than expected last week, evidence that companies are laying off fewer workers as the economy improves. The Labor Department said Thursday that initial claims for unemployment insurance fell to a seasonally adjusted 550,000 from an upwardly revised 576,000 in the previous week. Analysts expected claims to drop to 560,000, according to Thomson Reuters.

The number of people continuing to receive benefits fell by 159,000 to nearly 6.1 million, the lowest level since early April. The economy is showing consistent signs that the worst recession since the 1930s may be over.

That's a good outlook...IF YOU'RE EMPLOYED! OH, Washington is happy that there are FEWER people laid off than expected. Isn't that like you're glad that you weren't beaten HALF to death after your mugging? OH, and the cream on top of the cake...my old employer, Thomson Reuters is the one that they are listening to about this evidence. Not that I have anything bad to say about Thomson's analytics, they might be quite good in fact. My gripe is in how they treat front line employees. Which probably goes across the board from front line janitors to front line Wall Street Executives. Thomson blows. Well, they might not blow now. Maybe they've come under new management and had found salvation in god or something like that, but I remember when we were a small firm called ILX, where we got enormous benefits, and truckloads of perks, and the minute that these losers...Thomson, took over the reins, the first thing that they started doing was slashing away at all that shit. Their reason? Because they had to have benefits across the board at their company. Nobody there was getting the same benefits as we. Nice explanation, no?

This is the worst fucking recession since the 1930s and I find myself unemployed during the midst of it. I know, when I was my angriest on the streets in New York, I DIDN'T want to work in the 9to5 grind any more. I wanted to be a writer, a street poet, the host of an open mic show. I wanted to do all the swell things in life, and were willing to live the life necessary in doing it. But the truth of the matter is that, two years of living that life was enough for me. Two years of pounding my head against concrete in both directions was enough to cure me of some of the dreams and fantasies that I once had, and although I have not made a full recovery to complete sanity, my desire to follow my dreams have not waned completely, and most of my goals are not fantasies. I'm going to win against this one. I think I have within me at least ONE book sale. At least one job in the writing field. I can do it for free? Why can't I do it for pay? It's not that I don't have the skills, I just don't have the opportunity, and do you know why I haven't gotten the opportunity?

BECAUSE THERE IS A RECESSION GOIN' ON!

I'm not bitching and moaning...I'm just bitchin' n moanin'. I'm tired and would like a bit of solace, but I fear one thing now that I don't think that I'll ever recover from: Fear. Fear of being here, where I am. Fear of living on the streets indefinitely without rhyme or reason, such as my dear Electra. Never seeing an end to the harsh nights and sleepless days. Never finding a way out, and yet believing that you are strong enough to endure it indefinitely. I've learned that every day you spend in the street is two off your life. And my greatest fear...SCHNAPPING! Falling into the abyss. Crash and burning on the far coast of life.

These are a few of my fears that I don't think that a job will ever assuage. You feel them too. You feel this feeling. When you are threatened with your job by your employer you have the cold sleepless nights that follow. When you try putting your resume out there while you are working and don't get a nibble, or can't find any job that you qualify for, you are sincerely grateful that you have a job, even though it does not cover all of the bills, even if your spouse has to work just as hard as you do just to 'make ends meet'. There's never enough money to do anything. Never.

You know the fear I'm talking about.

Hey, I get the gout. It's the rich man's disease. Boy did my body get this shit wrong! It's just my bad karma coming back to haunt me. Maybe one day I'll change my situation....

maybe one day.

Hobobob