Am I Worth That Much?

My first Friday… I always laughed at the people who used to chortle, “TGIF”, but Thank God It’s Fucking Friday (TGIFF works just as well for me). A week of waking up at 5:50 AM has got me dragging, although it seems to be getting easier each morning. By the end of next week I will hopefully have my body trained.

It’s been a good week however, I think I am really going to enjoy this job. The egos I had been dreading upon my entry into the corporate world don’t seem to be present here, and the place is lacking the hierarchal structure that often alienates so many entry-level workers. I think everyone is so welcoming because I feed them, constantly. These people love to eat, and as a consequence they love to see me coming with their lunch in tow.

Perhaps the best part of the job is that I am finally contributing to the financial well-being of my family. Ana has been the sole breadwinner for such a long time that I was beginning to feel a bit inadequate. I worked at Starbucks for a couple of months, but the pay was so meager that it actually served to make me feel worse.

And a strange thing has happened because of my employment here; I have become acutely aware of the discrepancy between how much I get paid for the work I do and how little others are paid for the work they do. The Starbucks barista, the security guard, the delivery people – all of these people are woefully underpaid for their labors. I know I’ve put in my time as one of them, and that I may someday return to that level of employment, yet I can’t help but feel guilty about my success.

I am reminded of an analogy I heard on one of the self-motivation tapes I bought many years ago. According to Anthony Robbins, “Success is like a thermostat; when the temperature is too low, we turn up the dial. What many people don’t realize is that this thermometer acts in reverse. When it gets too hot, when we’ve achieved a level of success we don’t feel we deserve, we tend to turn it down”.

At the time I didn’t believe him because I wasn’t experiencing anything close to what I considered financial success. Now I understand exactly what he meant. I have often asked myself why I have this opportunity when others should not. Would someone with darker skin have gotten the same chance I had? I would like to think so, but I honest can’t admit to knowing for sure.

Regardless, I need to guard myself against these feelings. I spent nearly a year unemployed, and it makes no sense to return to that status. Besides, our near $100,000 debt from school is enough motivation to stay on the up and up, and working as a barista will never pay it off. Ironic that school should be the reason I can’t afford such esoteric questions.

How do Octopi Tell Each Other Apart?

Something funny struck me today as I was standing outside my office building. I was enjoying a small respite from work, busy puffing ten minutes off my life, and I happened to notice a gentleman walk by with a pink mohawk. Pink.

Now you might normally find this a strange sight, and I would have agreed with you were I still living in Wisconsin, but just yesterday I witnessed another man proudly sporting a pink mohawk… different man, same haircut. Pink.

A couple of weeks ago, Ariana and I walked by the cutest little poodle in Union Square with…wait for it...a pink mohawk.

And I suddenly realized as the most recent pink-headed man passed my way: We all like to think we are unique, but this simply isn’t possible. There are something like 6 billion people in this world, and not nearly that many haircuts. Some of us are going to have to share.

But this phenomenon isn’t confined simply to style, there are a great many of us who look alike as well. While on the bus home from the airport, I could have sworn I was watching my good friend Mark Gapen talk on a cell phone. He was sitting right across the aisle from me, and although I knew it wasn’t him, I had to do a double take. Same lips, same face structure, even the same style of speech…it was freaking eerie.

This isn’t the first time it’s happened. Ariana asserts that there’s a guy who looks just like me in one of her classes. Thank God I got to her first! It’s a strange feeling to know you have a doppelganger lurking about, especially when he or she lives in the same city as you. We aren’t supposed to get that close – we might disrupt the continuum of the universe.

Yet all this does not mean we are incapable of standing out, the mere fact that identical twins can have two separate personalities is a testament to our individuality. We simply have to guard ourselves against our own egos, we have to stand out by something other than our image – otherwise we end up with pink mohawks.

Random Musings on Tampa

Tampa is such a strange place; full of potential but devoid of people. Although small, the downtown is beautifully designed and laid out. There are plenty of pedestrian malls complete with fountains, the sidewalks are spacious and a pleasure to walk on, and yet the place is like a ghost town. It’s “The Day the Earth Stood Still”, Florida style.

The problem is four-fold:

1) For all the beautiful buildings that are present downtown, not one of them is residential. It’s the whole “If you build it, they will come” syndrome. People are generally homebodies, and you can guarantee that if they live downtown they will play downtown.

2) If you aren’t going to let people live downtown, at least make it easy for them to get there. The metropolitan area known as Tampa - St. Petersburg is choked with highways, and more often than not these arteries are under construction. It’s not pleasant to drive into downtown; not when a five-mile trip takes 45 minutes.

3) The public transportation here is a joke, almost not even worth mentioning. Sure the city has a bus system, but it is woefully inadequate. Besides, I have a hard time believing people down here would be willing to give up their automobiles for anything less than door-to-door rail transportation.

4) Last but not least, there is nothing for anyone to do downtown. In a city that has been overrun by Starbucks, there are surprisingly few cafes downtown (read: none). There are no shops for people to browse, there are no restaurants for people to eat in, and there are no bars for people to get wasted at. Why should anyone go downtown where there is nothing for them to do once they get there?

This place feels like the Los Angeles of the East, but it is admittedly very beautiful.

Life is Good, And Getting Better All The Time

As you can probably tell through my lack of posting, it’s been a busy week and a half. My trip to Tampa was thoroughly enjoyable, although I have to admit that I’m thankful to be back home. Spending time with my family was nice, especially in the warm southern sun, but I just don’t think I could live in Florida. I guess I have to admit I’m a northerner through and through.

I had an interview the day after I returned, and it went well – so well in fact that I got the job. I am employed once again! It’s a fantastic opportunity, the perfect blend of my experience in the restaurant industry and my desire for an office job. Essentially I am a food runner for a hedge fund company, which means I take care of the gastrointestinal desires of all the staff. It’s different than a restaurant in that I don’t actually prepare the food, I just distribute it once it’s been delivered. I don’t even have to find out what people want; there’s an online service where they can order from almost any place in the city and have it brought to the office automatically. This is New York after all, the delivery capitol of the U.S.

There are some other side responsibilities, but that is more or less what I do. It isn’t as glamorous as an executive, but I somehow I get the feeling I wouldn’t enjoy being a suit. Besides, I get all my meals paid for, access to the company gym, access to the company credit card, and my own personal view of New York City from the top floor of a 39-story building (the picture above is from the north side, my office has a southern view – from my desk I can see the Met Life Building, the Chrysler Building and a good chunk of Brooklyn… yes, my desk has a window!).

I don’t want to get overly excited because it is still a temporary job. I am technically employed by the staffing agency for the first thirty days, after which the company can decide to hire me full time. Should that happen, I would get at least $45k per year (plus bonuses) as well as full benefits. As it is now, I get $17/hour – not bad for a temp.

In other news, Ariana and I are officially Steve Jobs converts. We originally bought a 12-inch iBook for Ariana, and the very next day went bought another one for me. I couldn’t help it, I’m a hopeless gadget freak, and I knew I would find every excuse possible to use hers. Knowing this, she gave in. We love them. Built in wireless, Bluetooth, and the Mac operating system…we are officially free of the Microsoft machine.

Perhaps the best news is that Ariana is going to have the chance to go to Bosnia this summer. I’m saddened by the prospect of spending another three weeks apart, but excited for the opportunity it presents. Her career is really taking off, and admittedly every bit of it is due to her passion for what she does. I couldn’t be prouder to call her my wife. She’s a very impressive woman.