Everyone has jobs that they hate. I recently have had a slew of them. But what does that even mean? How can we hate something that gives us money to survive? Have you ever met an unemployed person? A homeless person? I mean I sometimes think the main dictum running through humanity's lifeblood on any given day is the tension between those who have and those who do not have, and those who have jobs are inevitably fighting every day to not be on the opposite side of that sword, the "I Don't Have a Job" school. So then our lives are reduced to our job or, as is often the case, JOBS, plural.
I recall writing a premature blog post back in college about my job anxiety:
What is a job to me? [12 May 2005|10:23am]
I scan the headlines of the newspaper obsessively for articles having to do with the unemployment rates. I half-heartedly glance at the classifieds. I skim Craig's List part-time jobs with no intention of applying. I even read the Sunday Times Employment supplement ("Job Market") to get an idea of what industries are on the decline, what aren't and interesting "hole-in-the-wall" type employments that charm people and give them hope.
And yet, my one page, inflated resume had only be distributed to on-campus jobs and a few off-campus internships. I have no intention of going and getting a part time job just yet. But I obsess with this idea of perpetual unemployment. Yes, yes. Mommy never had a stabled job, my father, as I know it, had none, my sisters, save Kate, don't make money doing what they love. My brother seems to enjoy his sporadic bouts of employment. Yet, instilled in me is this idea that money is scarce, employment hard to find, and when found, must be held on to despite its downsides, because of its very rarity.
The class on globalization I took has given me alittle perspective on the decline of real jobs with benefits (something I'd never encountewred before, though apparently before the late 70s and 80s, it was common for many Americans) and the replacement of contractless, fragmented labor. So, my suspicions are not without warrant. We are living in an unstable era, and what is most at stake is our financial security.
Yet, I do have time. I have time to stave off this paranoia. I am not yet graduating from college. I have have time to think and ruminate and mope and hope and smoke dope (if I choose, but do I....?) before I actually have to face the real world. Though, the phrase "facing the real world" really infuriates me because I feel that there is no dividing line between ones various lives. If you live every day anticipating this real world, you will be disappointed when it turns out to be much like your past reality, with a few sharpers edges, a few disconcerting details. Like the smell of fried chicken wafting into your rented room. Or the turning off of your lights and resorting to candles. By "real world" do people mean disappointment and misery? Because you can have that in any world...
JOB. J-O-B. Work. W-O-R-K. Anything can constitute these things. But will they ever make up me and who I am completely? I have yet to find out.
End quote. That was me as a first-year in college. Now I am a first-year in the "real world" and I have something to say about this distance. It has to do with the Depressed Domino Delivery guy and how he pulls at my heart strings and makes me think about my life and his life and their differences and, inevitably, the future.
The Depressed Domino Guy might be retarded I don't know, but his dejection is severe when he comes by weekly to hand off a pizza flyer to me.
Friday, October 31, 2008
Thursday, October 30, 2008
What Happened to My Mom's Email Account When She Died
She didn't use it that often. I don't think she knew quite how, grasping, or even wanting to grasp, the way the Internet works. but when she learned it could get letters places almost instantaneously, she wanted to partake if only because she loved to write and letters especially.
I remember sending her a letter, or maybe it was a phone call, of detailed instructions on how to set up an account and successfully compose and send messages. It read something like this:
1. Open up browser, should be called Internet Explorer or Netscape Navigator, something nautical to 'surf' the web. (This was before the days of Firefox, but now 'Safari' makes more sense.)
2. When it has opened (it might already be open) there will be a blank bar at the top of the page with the words typed in it beginning with "http://". Erase this. (I figured she had knowledge of keyboard commands since she'd used a typewriter most of her life. Though, like me, she preferred longhand.) Then, when erased, type in a new address. In your case it will be http://www.hotmail.com (alas, before the days of gmail).
3. When you arrive at the Hotmail homepage, type in your username and password. Click 'login'. This should take you to your inbox where you can read unread and new messages (and also old ones, for the sentimental and anal among us).
4. To compose a new message there should be a link in the upper left hand corner. Hit that and you will be taken to a new, blank message. Type in the address and subject and then type your letter into the blank box. Hit send when ready.
5. Be sure to log out!
Of course I got a couple calls from her asking me how exactly to do what and not understanding certain commands. Finally, though, it seemed she got the hang of it because emails started arriving in my mailbox with distinctly MHB titles: "Waiting for the shark attack at the bottom of the hill" or "LOVE EACH OTHER". Her emails, like her letters, were long and rambling, often stream-of-conscious treatise veiled as observations towards her daily environment. When she learned the "cc" tool she would send them to all six kids at once and all her adopted children in spirit. Total: usually 8.
I found it hard to read, absorb, and respond to her messages in one sitting, so there would usually be a couple stages until I was ready to respond. I often wouldn't respond to all of them, just as with her paper letters, simply because the volume in which they arrived was overwhelming. In this idiosyncratic way, I just might be turning into my mother.
But no one could write a letter like my mom--one that actually brought you into her world, and then her brain at the same time. It was a heady gift and sometimes more than I could handle. But like her I have become a letter writer, by no means as prolific, or intense, and I prefer to send mine by mail.
Part of me knows exactly what happened to my mom's email account when she died. Perhaps it even happened before she died. Email accounts become inactive and expire if someone doesn't log in for, say, 90 days. I'm sure that my mother hadn't the time to check her email in the months of sickness leading up to her death. But it's possible she checked it just enough to keep it alive. So when she left the earth, breathed her last breath, her email account did not--spam or newsletters were still directed to the account miriamhborkowski@hotmail.com.
There's something so crass about the thought of this though, an illumination of how cold and impersonal technology is. You just use it for a purpose but it has no idea of when you're sad or excited or sick.
Just like a person's MySpace account after they die, which cryptically records their last login--usually the day of death. But technology's vessel-like apathy can be surmounted. MySpace comment walls become de-facto memorials, where people can still post: "Thinking about you. Can't believe it's been a year."
I remember sending her a letter, or maybe it was a phone call, of detailed instructions on how to set up an account and successfully compose and send messages. It read something like this:
1. Open up browser, should be called Internet Explorer or Netscape Navigator, something nautical to 'surf' the web. (This was before the days of Firefox, but now 'Safari' makes more sense.)
2. When it has opened (it might already be open) there will be a blank bar at the top of the page with the words typed in it beginning with "http://". Erase this. (I figured she had knowledge of keyboard commands since she'd used a typewriter most of her life. Though, like me, she preferred longhand.) Then, when erased, type in a new address. In your case it will be http://www.hotmail.com (alas, before the days of gmail).
3. When you arrive at the Hotmail homepage, type in your username and password. Click 'login'. This should take you to your inbox where you can read unread and new messages (and also old ones, for the sentimental and anal among us).
4. To compose a new message there should be a link in the upper left hand corner. Hit that and you will be taken to a new, blank message. Type in the address and subject and then type your letter into the blank box. Hit send when ready.
5. Be sure to log out!
Of course I got a couple calls from her asking me how exactly to do what and not understanding certain commands. Finally, though, it seemed she got the hang of it because emails started arriving in my mailbox with distinctly MHB titles: "Waiting for the shark attack at the bottom of the hill" or "LOVE EACH OTHER". Her emails, like her letters, were long and rambling, often stream-of-conscious treatise veiled as observations towards her daily environment. When she learned the "cc" tool she would send them to all six kids at once and all her adopted children in spirit. Total: usually 8.
I found it hard to read, absorb, and respond to her messages in one sitting, so there would usually be a couple stages until I was ready to respond. I often wouldn't respond to all of them, just as with her paper letters, simply because the volume in which they arrived was overwhelming. In this idiosyncratic way, I just might be turning into my mother.
But no one could write a letter like my mom--one that actually brought you into her world, and then her brain at the same time. It was a heady gift and sometimes more than I could handle. But like her I have become a letter writer, by no means as prolific, or intense, and I prefer to send mine by mail.
Part of me knows exactly what happened to my mom's email account when she died. Perhaps it even happened before she died. Email accounts become inactive and expire if someone doesn't log in for, say, 90 days. I'm sure that my mother hadn't the time to check her email in the months of sickness leading up to her death. But it's possible she checked it just enough to keep it alive. So when she left the earth, breathed her last breath, her email account did not--spam or newsletters were still directed to the account miriamhborkowski@hotmail.com.
There's something so crass about the thought of this though, an illumination of how cold and impersonal technology is. You just use it for a purpose but it has no idea of when you're sad or excited or sick.
Just like a person's MySpace account after they die, which cryptically records their last login--usually the day of death. But technology's vessel-like apathy can be surmounted. MySpace comment walls become de-facto memorials, where people can still post: "Thinking about you. Can't believe it's been a year."
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