Thursday, April 30, 2009

Every night, a beating (pt. 2)

Since July 2005 I have been employed by a sizable Memphis-based corporation, the locale of which I’ve distinguished over the years with a variety of disparaging names that are better left unmentioned. However crude and unnecessary the labels, I nevertheless find it odd to be grateful that I merely have a job, even one that takes such an arduous nightly toll as mine.

Like many of my fellow Gen Xers, I know what it is to be unemployed. I once went a full year without an income despite my corporate background and brand spankin’ new college degree, so the frustration of not being a regular tax payer isn’t foreign territory at all.

Additionally, the notion that I would have little trouble finding a suitable employer soon crumbled beneath the impact of a progressively deteriorating economy and the widespread reluctance to hire a late-20-something college grad who was trying to take his career in a direction that differed from his past work experience.

Ironically the occupation I ended up with -- the identity of which I’ve chosen to withhold -- was indeed strikingly different from all other jobs I’ve held in the past. Before I was a suit-and-tie guy. Now, and for nearly four years, I have come to epitomize the blue collar in a place that tests my mettle every night.

I attempt to keep the negative underpinnings of my job from encroaching upon life outside the workplace, and it helps to know that I'm far from the only one who can barely tolerate the thought of having to spend yet another night/morning in a work environment that has been known to incite violence.

Still the quality people I've encountered over the past 45 months (Non-Con/Gate 502, Load Team 7, etc.) have been largely overshadowed by an abundance of individuals who simply don't give a you-know-what. Whether it's inherent or learned, you'd be further shocked to find how some people have such a difficult time walking through an already open door. And that, in a nutshell, is the nature of the beast.

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