A Commentary on Our Generation

It's true: my job isn't very intellectually stimulating. Sure, I have days where I'm crazed, days where I don't know which task to tackle first. All in all, though, as my friends so lovingly joke, I'm someone's "bitch." (Sorry to all you feminists out there, but it's true.) I support someone else, an MD who runs research labs that have discovered countless genes-- discoveries that have already saved some labs and will hopefully save many more in the future. Did I go to a highly-recognized school to support another person? No. Did my family have to shell out well over $200,000 just so that I could earn my meager salary that pays the rent but doesn't allow for a ton of disposable income? Nope, definitely not.

That said, I'm happy. Really, I am. OK, I know that doesn't sound convincing, but you just have to take my word for it. On a miserably humid day like today, I'm thankful that I don't believe in that I'm not drenched in sweat chasing four year olds through a sprinkler at camp like I used to back in the day. (I'm more grateful that I'm not cleaning up after their accidents post-sprinkler on any day.) In fact, I'm sitting here with a smile on my face (on the inside at least) because I'm covered in goosebumps from the chill of my office's air conditioning. And on days like this, believe me, it feels amazing to be inside a freezing high-rise in my jail-like cubicle; my small salary feels worthwhile. Plus, I work for a great company and with and for great people, so really, who am I to complain?

Overall, though, I am grateful. My job can feel "below me" at times and it for sure isn't comfortable getting myself out of bed and into the unpleasant weather, only to sit at my desk to schedule someone else's appointments and apply for his multi-million dollar grants. But each and every time that I feel like this flat out sucks (aint no classier way to say it, honestly) I remind myself-- thankfully I'm not at home. I also try to remind myself that maybe in some indirect way I'm helping others-- if I schedule my boss's time to take a breath or eat a bite of sandwich, I'm helping to manage his time so he can save lives.

Now, please understand, I'm not knocking any of my friends who are at home and living with their parents. I understand that people have loans to pay and that many people can't get jobs during these unfortunate times. I mean, according to the most recent estimates, almost 10% of the American population can't get a job. That's nothing to laugh at. As they say, tough times call for tough measures, and those measures might include moving back into a childhood home with a mom and dad who insist on attaching a GPS armband to their kid to monitor their whereabouts at all times.

What I don't respect, though, are the people who could find themselves financially capable of moving out and being on their own, but are unwilling to take any job that they consider to be in that "below them" range. I have plenty of friends like that-- friends who won't take a job that pays a decent salary because they don't immediately sense any upward mobility coming from that position.

As I rode the subway this morning-- my ultimate destination after Starbucks being this cubicle, of course-- I skimmed The New York Times as I always do. Now I wasn't actively thinking about this whole having a job vs. not having a job concept, but I think it's always in the back of my mind during my commutes. Anyway, one of the top ten articles, American Dream Is Elusive for New Generation: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/07/business/economy/07generation.html?_r=1&hp. The article essentially profiles a guy who's a couple of years older than me who sits home unemployed day after day. He turned down a job that offered him a $40,000 salary, feeling it would fail to lead him in a worthwhile direction and that the pay was too low. Meanwhile, his parents support him: they pay his rent, his cellphone bills and allow him send out only four or five resumes per week. (They're, of course, not enablers or anything.)

Let me tell you that when I was looking for work, I sent in close to fifty resumes per day. I did anything that I could to land a job. When I was looking to switch from one job that was too unbearable to the next, I was even willing to take a pay cut. A pay cut! Anything to maintain my independence. I would have rather sat and answered phones all day (with memories of my undergraduate career lurking in the background) just to be able to pay my own way. No job, I realized, is below me, and it shames me to think that so many of my peers are willing to mooch off their parents-- the same parents who have already supported them for well over twenty years-- just because they don't want to do something that, to them, feels degrading.

I don't know much about the business world, but I do know this: it looks much better to be doing a job like mine than to be sitting home and watching TV all day. No employer wants to know that a candidate spent the past sixteen months watching Hoarders and The Bachelor on DVR and Seinfeld on syndication. Getting up and going to work every day-- whether it's working construction or as an investment banker or scrubbing filthy toilets-- is a much more valuable use of your time.

So, to the people of my generation, I have to say that I almost plead with you: get up and do something. Prove your intelligence and your good work ethic, and that The New York Times has been portraying us incorrectly. And for the love of God, drop that Chipotle burrito, get off your parents' couch, erase that higher-than-though attitude from your mind, and work hard like the rest of us. Our grandparents, great-grandparents, even our parents did it, and there's no reason we shouldn't.


XOXO,
R.

PS: For more on how others perceive members of our generation, please see this article from a May edition of the New York Times Magazine: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/30/magazine/30fob-wwln-t.html. Again, another reason to prove everyone wrong.

Clinton's Wife was the First Lady and Gore's is called Tipper, Right?

As a kid I spent a few summers on a local college campus attending day camp. College universities obviously don't completely shutdown for the season even though there often seems to be a shortage of kegs, sleazy frat boys and scantily-clad females. So there would often be an important visitor or two around to give a lecture or take a tour.

One day a rumor spread like wildfire: the Tipper was here! The Tipper was here! Clearly she was really important as she was the Vice-President's WIFE. It was only after an entire day of hearing this that I learned that she wasn't in fact THE Tipper, but rather Tipper was her first name. I was foolishly led to believe that our country had a President, a First Lady, a Vice President and a Tipper.

I'm told there was a huge uproar over "The Great Gore Kiss" involving that very same woman in 2000 at the Democratic National Convention. (See http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/video/al-gore-and-tipper-gore-kiss-at-the-dnc-10797435). I'm somewhat surprised that a political figure of such importance could get away wish such an expression of love on national television. I read an article somewhere in which the reporter labeled it a "Can't wait to see you later in the bedroom, baby" kiss. To me the gesture seems over-the-top, even though it's many years later. But really, to me personally it doesn't matter at all. I hadn't thought about that women since I was running from outdoor swim to the kickball field in one sock and two Tevas.

Flash forward from around that era to 2010. I clearly hadn't thought about this lady in years, but somehow she's once again in the spotlight, even though her husband is no longer in office. Or, shall I say, soon-to-be ex-husband. Now the passion has gone from revolving around her nauseatingly overt/hopelessly romantic (depending on how you look at it) on-stage PDA to how could the epitome of a perfect couple go down the tubes?

Is it sad that this couple broke up even when Hillary and Bill have managed to stay together after he "didn't have sexual relations with that woman"? Yes, for sure. It's also disappointing that their marriage won't boast a fairytale ending, even if they began it on that track by meeting at their prom. We wonder whether that kiss that so many Americans witnessed was falsified or exaggerated. On the flip side, perhaps everything really was that fabulous between the duo and the relationship only crumbled afterwards.

Well ladies and gentleman, it's a sad fact, but a true one: you never really know what's going on in someone's relationship unless you're one of the two members. Or maybe more than two members. I'm thankfully not in your bedroom to know.

A lot of times couples put up the facade that all is fine and dandy-- obviously the husband takes out the trash without asking and he even picks up his socks without his wife having to incessantly nag him. The husband, of course, never gets frustrated because the wife never takes an hour to straighten her hair, another half hour to put on her face and forty-five more minutes selecting an outfit. Everything is glorious, unless you're exposed to the true inner workings of the couple, watching them maintain their home and coordinate their mutual social calendar.

So what am I getting at here? First, I think this situation has made me recognize that it's important to never be jealous of any couple or family because they appear flawless and content. Like there are talented athletes and writers in this world, we all know that there exist exceptionally convincing actors. Just because a couple gives off the impression that they never argue over who let the seat up, it doesn't mean that they have a sizzling sex life or laid-back living situation. For all you know, they could sleep in separate beds because one of them...snores. Right.

It's also important to remember that it's not overly beneficial to any couple for outsiders to scrutinize their relationship. It doesn't help us to consider marriages gone wrong when they don't involve us, mainly because, as I said before, we really don't know what was really going on behind closed doors. So instead of considering this situation from a depressing angle like so much of the media has, I'm not going to consider it at all. I, for one, positively don't know anything about their relationship-- I couldn't even get her name right.


XOXO,
RC