So you don’t have a job, huh, friend? Me either! We should play board games. But first, I thought I’d provide a minute guide to joblessness so you can get your directionless life in order. You’ve got to trust me on this, I’m like opposite-day Henry Ford. (In that I’m aggressively unproductive, not the whole “too many Jews” thing.) Follow my lead and you’ll be “doing great” and “really just enjoying life” in no time.
Stop saying “funemployment”. There’s nothing worse than pathetic denial, especially when it’s masked as acerbic realism. Sorry, Steve No-Jobs, your self-aware, bitter wordplay is a joke on nobody but yourself. Everybody understands that not finding work is sad and scary, tempered with moments of freewheeling recklessness. If you had leukemia you wouldn’t go to the bar and order a “brewkemia” and then laugh tremulously. Don’t torture yourself, we’ll get through this together. Onward…
Regular fashion and grooming do not apply. You need to understand that you are not one of the daywalkers. Your understandable instinct to retain the regalia of civilization is an obstacle to be surmounted. Keep your clothing and body clean to the extent that you are comfortable, but stop ironing or mending frays in your clothes. Don’t pay any mind to color schemes, fit, or “fresh” factor. Nobody gives a fuck what you look like; your friends will extra-sensorially perceive your desperation when you join them for a beer and know at once that this is your first time leaving the house in three days. The effect of accomplishment cannot be imitated, accept this and move on.
Try to maintain a regular schedule. This one’s a bit of a curveball: you might think that I’m urging conscientiousness and health in the face of adversity and the prospect of near-future occupation, but really, it’s just important to your new life to stay fairly on track with society even as you skirt its margins. You could easily get thrown into a K-hole (the K is for krushing depression) at the onset of a sudden milkshake craving, upon which you get your coat on and walk out the door only to remember that Dairy Queen is not open at four A.M. However, the observance of this by-law—if done correctly—stands in accord with the next item…
Don’t forget that it’s okay to get drunk whenever you want. This might seem self-evident, but it’s easy to fall into old habits and forget that society just developed an arbitrary system for success to prevent you from drinking all day, like you’ve kind of wanted to all the time, even while watching Leaving Las Vegas. But what the Man now calls “acting like an idiot” and “ruining your body,” the Founding Fathers called “living free,” and it is currently your prerogative to grab the highball and run, you American Dreamer.
The time is now. During a recession, the only way to stay sane when you hit the dead-end on Paycheck Street is to remember that there are experiences tailored for people in your position. If there were any doorstop Russian novels your college syllabus missed (I’m assuming, since you’re reading this, that you were an English major), get to the library and start Karamazov-ing. There are, by my brief headcount, seventy-eight different Star Trek series, and you need to live-tweet every episode. That giant quilt depicting the fall of Saigon ain't gonna quilt itself. In the next year you’re either going to die of starvation or come to your senses, take out a loan and go to business school, and spend the rest of your life drooling in a cubicle with five days at Cape Cod every year. So go have your epic indoor fun right now. Final Fantasy XIII is ninety hours long, and the sequel comes out next week.
Ramen is the most delicious food ever. I know, I always forget, too! Weird. If you can’t bring yourself to make it for breakfast, just sleep until lunchtime.
Recognize your solitude. Make no mistake—those around you with professions, plans, life goals and otherwise motivated existences will look down on you. Don’t blame them; ours is the age of fractured egos, and we all need to stand on the static husks of others to feel tall sometimes. But don’t let them get you down, either. Learn to interpret their little remarks of encouragement: “How was your day” really means That bathrobe you never take off is a tapestry of despair. “Any job leads lately” translates to You disgust me; If I come back later and you’re still surfing Craigslist in front of muted soap operas I’ll actually throw up. You can tolerate this by acknowledging your access to a plane of being they cannot know. You are not of their world, shoeless one. Tune it out.
You are still “keeping busy”. No, no, not really. You just need to become adept at deflection. People are going to catch wind of your status, and unless you can paint a picture of activity they’ll opportunistically try to snare you for any nonsense they need help with or “think you might enjoy”. Friends need help moving? You’re, unfortunately, “intellectually occupied” (Thursday crossword). Parents need you to housesit? You have “opportunities not to be left unattended” (bar trivia tomorrow). You’re not selfish. You’re just busy realizing the paragon of the unoccupied you. You’re being all you can’t be. You’re free. Be nobody’s loafer but your own.
Regular fashion and grooming do not apply. You need to understand that you are not one of the daywalkers. Your understandable instinct to retain the regalia of civilization is an obstacle to be surmounted. Keep your clothing and body clean to the extent that you are comfortable, but stop ironing or mending frays in your clothes. Don’t pay any mind to color schemes, fit, or “fresh” factor. Nobody gives a fuck what you look like; your friends will extra-sensorially perceive your desperation when you join them for a beer and know at once that this is your first time leaving the house in three days. The effect of accomplishment cannot be imitated, accept this and move on.
Try to maintain a regular schedule. This one’s a bit of a curveball: you might think that I’m urging conscientiousness and health in the face of adversity and the prospect of near-future occupation, but really, it’s just important to your new life to stay fairly on track with society even as you skirt its margins. You could easily get thrown into a K-hole (the K is for krushing depression) at the onset of a sudden milkshake craving, upon which you get your coat on and walk out the door only to remember that Dairy Queen is not open at four A.M. However, the observance of this by-law—if done correctly—stands in accord with the next item…
Don’t forget that it’s okay to get drunk whenever you want. This might seem self-evident, but it’s easy to fall into old habits and forget that society just developed an arbitrary system for success to prevent you from drinking all day, like you’ve kind of wanted to all the time, even while watching Leaving Las Vegas. But what the Man now calls “acting like an idiot” and “ruining your body,” the Founding Fathers called “living free,” and it is currently your prerogative to grab the highball and run, you American Dreamer.
The time is now. During a recession, the only way to stay sane when you hit the dead-end on Paycheck Street is to remember that there are experiences tailored for people in your position. If there were any doorstop Russian novels your college syllabus missed (I’m assuming, since you’re reading this, that you were an English major), get to the library and start Karamazov-ing. There are, by my brief headcount, seventy-eight different Star Trek series, and you need to live-tweet every episode. That giant quilt depicting the fall of Saigon ain't gonna quilt itself. In the next year you’re either going to die of starvation or come to your senses, take out a loan and go to business school, and spend the rest of your life drooling in a cubicle with five days at Cape Cod every year. So go have your epic indoor fun right now. Final Fantasy XIII is ninety hours long, and the sequel comes out next week.
Ramen is the most delicious food ever. I know, I always forget, too! Weird. If you can’t bring yourself to make it for breakfast, just sleep until lunchtime.
Recognize your solitude. Make no mistake—those around you with professions, plans, life goals and otherwise motivated existences will look down on you. Don’t blame them; ours is the age of fractured egos, and we all need to stand on the static husks of others to feel tall sometimes. But don’t let them get you down, either. Learn to interpret their little remarks of encouragement: “How was your day” really means That bathrobe you never take off is a tapestry of despair. “Any job leads lately” translates to You disgust me; If I come back later and you’re still surfing Craigslist in front of muted soap operas I’ll actually throw up. You can tolerate this by acknowledging your access to a plane of being they cannot know. You are not of their world, shoeless one. Tune it out.
You are still “keeping busy”. No, no, not really. You just need to become adept at deflection. People are going to catch wind of your status, and unless you can paint a picture of activity they’ll opportunistically try to snare you for any nonsense they need help with or “think you might enjoy”. Friends need help moving? You’re, unfortunately, “intellectually occupied” (Thursday crossword). Parents need you to housesit? You have “opportunities not to be left unattended” (bar trivia tomorrow). You’re not selfish. You’re just busy realizing the paragon of the unoccupied you. You’re being all you can’t be. You’re free. Be nobody’s loafer but your own.
You've made me uncomfortably aware of my own lifestyle in a delightful way. Bravo. I particularly liked "That bathrobe you never take off is a tapestry of despair"
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