The eighth graders at the library have sharper tongues than my current crackhead clientele. The office politics at my last non-profit job were far more sickening. The patrons were rougher at the old redneck watering hole. But it's hard to think of a job I've had that's more humbling. Not because it's mucky and gross, but because physically it's so damn demanding. At the end of the day, you're not clever or witty -- you're covered in filth, every muscle aches, your brain is fried, and your feet want to die a crying death. You sit unsteadily on the back stairs, enjoying a rare cigarette. The fog descends from behind Sutro Tower. The trumpet flowers wave in the cool evening breeze. 800 yards to your right, the enormous and charmingly homely rainbow flag at the corner of Castro and Market ripples and flaps. There is no internal commentary, no itch to do anything but just sit there and exist.
* * *
The job provides moments of satisfaction: you're doing good, necessary work. You get to thumb your nose at NIMBYish neighbors simply by existing. And the work makes you strong -- very strong. No need to go to the gym. The gay boys and girls are impressed with your wood-hard forearms, and the straight guys treat you with a measure of deference. An interesting sort of prestige wholly different from the library thing.
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An aside to elitist gays: buying recycling is not 'trashy.' Trashy is double-carding visitors to the Midnight Sun because they're not white males. Trashy is sneering at the poor queer trannies who hang out at LYRIC even as you buy meth and other club drugs from their abusive, paroled boyfriends. Trashy is being able to have sustained conversations about nothing other than nutritional supplements and reps. My job is grimy and dirty, but it is not trashy - it's actually quite honest.
Just a distinction I'd like some to observe...
* * *
So yeah, it's a shit job. But then again, aren't they all?Labels: random, the shitty
