Corporate Junkies

Today on my train ride into work I got to see something I never see: blue collar workers.  I've been taking the Green Line "L" train to work because it's closer to the hotel Rick and I are staying at while our kitchen is re-done (upstairs neighbor, busted water heater, have insurance, long story - let's leave it at that). Because the Green Line travels East into downtown along more of the residential street route intead of directly down I-290, the way my usual Blue Line does, I am able to see people working. The Green Line passes all sorts of repair shops, factories, and warehouses where men in Carhartt overalls and steel toe boots plan out the day's work in wild hand gestures or over grease-stained clipboards. How revitalizing it can be to do something new and see something different. All I see riding the train down I-290 are other corporate junkies not lucky enough or smart enough to take public transport to work.  Some may think the term corporate junkie harsh. How dare I compare the white-collar, economy-driving, proud-parent-making, industry leaders of Chicago to common drug addicts?

Are we reallly that different? Most of us wish every day to be doing something more meaningful, more fulfilling than sitting behind a desk (or in a meeting) for 8+ hours trying to figure out new and better ways to fill the shareholders' 401(K) accounts. But we keep doing it each and every day. No matter how much we despise it - or ourselves - at the end of that eight hour day, we've become accustomed to what corporate life provides. We've done it so long we don't know anything else and most of us are just too scared to quit. What more than that can be said for your average, every day drug addict?  Do you think at the end of the day an alcohlic says - as they're coming off their bender - 'today felt really good. I'm glad I spent the past 8 hours polishing off more vodka than a Russian wedding reception."

There are still the social and health issues that come with actual drug addiction to which corporate addiction can't be compared, yet correlations exist. The stress that not only the job, but also the corporate environment has on a body can be similarly devastating as constant drug use.  And that's if everything is OK. Throw a neurotic boss, impossible client, or massive deadline into the mix and you're probably doing enough legal or illegal drugs on the side to be considered a true addict. Socially, corporate life is well accepted as compared to say - meth usage. But I'll tell you when in a social situation someone asks me about what I do for a living I'd almost rather be curled up in a closet boiling a spoon. Ok, now that is going too far. But the way "what do you do for a living" knocks the wind out of my sails can't be much different than what a meth addict feels when someone asks them what'd they do today ..."well I woke up around noon to find that I'd ground down the last of my teeth during the night then I spent the next 16 hours trying to find enough money to get high, getting high, then trying to find money again."  Ask me that same question on a Tuesday and if I feel like rehashing my despair I'll say something like,

"I snoozed my alarm for 45 minutes before convincing myself that I've taken enough mental health days this month, seriously considered finishing off the wine glass left from last night so I'd be aptly prepared to spend the day taking it up the rear from my clients while trying to respond to last week's emails and watching the ones from this week pile up. And I think my morning coffee substituted for any actual food throughout the day, but to tell you the truth I don't really remember because just like any other drug corporate life can make you forget to eat, yet not get hungry."

You see what I mean?  The similarities are uncanny. Others may argue that corporate life facilitates financial well-being while drug addiction destroys it. My counterpoint is that corporate life provides only a semblance of financial security. The steady income lulls us into a level of dependcy that keeps us coming back. How many of us spend money we don't have or do have but shouldn't spend because we tell ourselves we'll make it up next paycheck. Most of us - whether we realize it or not - are one pink slip or solemn call with HR away from destitution. Fearful of not being able to keep up our beyond-our-means lifestyles, we sucumb to the soul-numbing mediocracy that comes with being a corporate junkie.

Kudos to those that make it out and don't end up back; the restaurant or boutique owners, the art dealers, and antique shop keepers, the inventors and patent holders.  It's a fine line though because just like any other addiction it's hard to stay clean. The more successful you become once you're out, the closer you are to becoming your own corporation and creating the very prison that you tried so hard to break out of. We are a capitalist society, an open market.  Therefore, it is possible to become wildly rich and successful outside of corporate America, but it is almost impossible to do so without creating corporate junkies of your own.

So tell me, how is your addiction treating you? Do you work corporate, but insist you're not a junkie? Have you been there and broken free?  Like Scarface, did they drag you back? Please enlighten me...

Working for the Weekend (Literally)

So during Rick's time on medical leave he realized how difficult work can be when you've gotten accustomed to not doing it.  It's both liberating to have him feel my pain -you know, that pain I get each Sunday evening and when we come back from vacation - but it's also disheartening to know that maybe it's not possible to fall into a job that you end up loving.  Rick never daydreamed about working in demolition, but isn't it almost every straight boy's dream to tear a structure to pieces. Doesn't every guy wish that instead of doing whatever he does with his days he's picking up a sledge hammer and showing a wall why we walk upright? Sure, the job is hard and the hours are sometimes terrible (like when you have to go in at 9 o'clock on a Friday night leaving your wife to her blog and bottle of wine...), but it's something different almost everyday, makes working out in your spare time completely unnecessary, and you get to come home dirty like you did something with yourself for the past 8 hours.  And yeah it cut me to the core to hear him talk about how much he enjoyed work. Yet, now that the he's singing the opposite tune it cuts even deeper. Before I was just jealous, now I'm concerned.  Now I understand how he must feel to see me stressed out and sometimes completely wiped out at the thought of another day doing what I do.

Add this to the list of things I'm learning about married life. I genuinely care about my husband's day-to-day happiness.  There's no doubt that his battle with cancer has softened my woe-is-me attitude about my life and made me more accomodating to his needs and it's not like when we weren't married I didn't give a shit.  Just, never did I imagine it would be like this. Before leaving for work tonight he says,

"I wanna quit my jooooob."
I thought to myself, 'that's my line!" Because it is.
So I replied, "You can't quit your job. I want to quit my job!"

As if I had dibbs on quitting and as if we're in any financial position for either of us to even think of quitting. Finally we agreed that whomever makes more money has to keep their job. That was his idea.

I agreed, "Ok. What hourly?" Considering he makes close to twice as much hourly than I would if you turned my salary into an hourly wage. 

I'd put him in a conundrum, but his response makes me think he'd already had this conversation with himself. Because he replies,

"Annually. We'll add up our W-2 forms from the past three years and whoever made more keeps their job."

Quite a well-thought out argument if I do say so myself. He must have gotten the idea from daytime TV (damn night jobs). So we're going to compare W-2's, but no, no one will be quitting. We've got a long way to go to financial freedom and looking at past W-2's certainly won't get us there.