As God as My Witness, I Better Not Be Jobless Again

Praise God! I finally have a job. I'm working part time as the Graduate Coordinator in the Comparative Literature department at UT. After applying at more than 50 places and finding that, on average, 200-400 people had also applied, I had run out of hope. When Hertz Rent-a-Car doesn't want you behind the counter, you start to doubt yourself.


After seven months of unemployment, here is what I've learned:

1. Being unemployed is GREAT.
There is nothing you have to get up for, no being stuck inside on beautiful afternoons, no sharing thermostats with hot-flashing-menopausal women, morning tooth brushing is optional, and when the three o'clock sleepies roll in, naps can freely happen. It's a wonderful thing to be free. I may have spent five years studying the politics of our country, but only now do I appreciate why the Declaration of Independence is "such a big deal."

2. Being unemployed is TERRIBLE.
There is nothing you have to get up for. It is crushing to find a job you are highly/overly qualified for, spending hours artfully crafting the perfect mix of corporate lingo and lies in a cover letter - in the process becoming hopeful about your chances - and calling to find out that every human being who has ever received an English degree wants to be an assistant to the mail clerk as much as you do. It's hard coming to terms with the fact that all the hard work and achievements of the past eight years of your life aren't worth much of anything.

3. Being unemployed is AIMLESS.
Without a careful plan, aimlessness quickly settles in. Being aimless is only fun for a few days until you realize that you're basically turning into a Paris Hilton with less money, but with a soul. No one wants to feel useless. Even the places I tried to volunteer didn't need me.

4. Being unemployed is LONELY.
Working forced me to interact with people I would, at first blush, go to great lengths to avoid. Though I didn't realize it until recently, spending time with work-weirdos is vital to my social stability and is way better than being left alone by myself because, as it turns out, I am by far the most annoying person I know.

5. Being unemployed is EXPENSIVE.
Financial experts recommend having about 3 months of emergency savings. I am here to tell you if you have a liberal arts degree and live in Austin, the locus of every educated, unemployed, free-thinking, 20-40-something in the western hemisphere, you should have at least a year of savings or be prepared to sleep under a bridge. Money is easy if you have it and hard if you don't. It's hard not to worry about not having enough. It's doubly hard to watch people begging once you realize you could just as easily be in their position.

I'm so grateful to have a job, even part time. I may have to give up eating, but I'll have money for rent, a little bit of purpose each day, plenty of unusual people to interact with, and a little freedom left over.