... well, this past week I was served with papers for the court date over the eviction... the case goes to court on the 20th, but there's nothing I can do about it, I have nothing to offer to help stop this from happening... I brought this on myself, I know, when I left my last job... you can call it a midlife crisis or just my rebellion against my own life, which is kind of how I see it... I was just so sick of working in that bakery for that man, dealing with their unbusinesslike and unsanitary practices (like leaving chicken out all night on a table to thaw for the next day; and not caring if the deli meat case broke down overnight and all the meat sat in 90 degree temps during the summer; and my boss repeatedly sneezing into his bare hands and then still working around food without washing up - and then one time a customer called the Board of Health after seeing him do this, he had the gall to turn on the workers and say it was us who did such things, not him)... and having him keep my hours down so that I had to work 7 days a week and often for months at a time, and couldn't afford a day off or a vacation... oh, I know if pressed he would say "Oh, Robert only had to ask and he could have had time off"... but that's not how it worked out... my hours were so low that often I had to work all those days just to make my rent and buy food... and often, when I would get a day off, the day before it he would tell me he needed to work cause a family emergency came up, and then I would find out he actually went to play golf instead... one year I even tried three times to get a day off to visit my mother's grave with her best friend, Pauline, and he would say yes, and then when the day came he would tell me he gave the day to someone else and I had to work it afterall...
... I am sick of the jobs I've had to take in my life... jobs I had to take just to survive, that is why I took them and suffered them, because I had no choice... but the past three jobs I've had in my life (and I was at the bakery 11 years, the caterers 6 years, these were not flash-in-the-pan jobs) left me no better off when I left them than when I started with them... this last job at the bakery, I was making only $12,000 a year... and my rent on this apartment is over $10,000 a year... so you see how I couldn't afford to take a day off the way my boss had me set up... oh yes, he'd give me a raise every year... but then he'd trim some more hours off, never mind I had seniority over other workers there... they would get their time, and I would just get cut... 11 years there, and I was making the same money as when I first started...
... and the last day there, when I knew I was really at the end of being able to deal with it all, then he started a fierce argument with me that turned personal, calling me an idiot and ignorant... and that's when I lost it and fought back, telling him about all the mistakes he had made in this business, from selling day-old bagels and breads as fresh to the way he treated customers... and I didn't even quit on the spot, I tried to come home and calm down, but I knew there was no way I was going back there... I was done...
... I almost don't really care what happens to me now... working a normal job has gotten me nowhere in my life... and I am a good worker, I'm always early and I have no problem doing the tough jobs or the work no one else wants to do... I take pride in that... but anymore I don't care, I hate the idea of jobs, of bosses, the whole system and idea of them... the jobs I've had have always made me feel like a dog they keep tied up with food just out of reach - there are always promises, but nothing real... bakery boss was always big on dangling hours in front of me, but then he'd change his mind... and the funny thing is, I never asked for a raise, in all the 11 years I was there... I always asked for more hours... and he used to get mad at other employees who asked for raises, he would tell them you should ask for more hours instead... and here I ask for more hours, and he would get mad at me when I did, saying I had the greatest job in the place, how dare I ask for more... well I had to ask for more cause I was the only employee in the place who had a rent to pay and bills... everyone else lived at home still...
I almost feel I'll never work again... unless some job or person comes along that changes my mind... or unless the old Bob kicks in again, the one who will take any job just to survive... but I'm angry and depressed over this... and yes, I'm going to lose a lot getting evicted now, and I'll never be able to rent another apartment again, I'm sure... I'm heading on a bad path and I am scared... but for one thing, it's too late now...
... and I did try to find a new job, last year (2007) there was a great full time job at the Pet Shoppe, and I gave my boss at the bakery three weeks notice... and he broke down... he was nearly in tears, saying the bakery would close if I left, and I got mad saying, What do you mean? You have me down to three hours a day? What does my work here matter?... but he hounded me for three days to change my mind, even calling me up at home while he was drunk, to talk me out of going... and stupid stupid stupid me, I gave in... and lo and behold, what happened? ... a few months later I was served papers along with my boss to go to court for a case involving an old employee who had been hurt by a machine at the bakery... I think that's the real reason my boss didn't want me to leave, he knew he might need me in court... and in the end they didn't even need my testimony... and it was after that, in March of this year, that my boss' attitude with me really changed, and he just began to be irritable around me...
... after all this, needless to say I was denied unemployment, even tho I told them all about the job and things my boss had done... (and I haven't even mentioned his lying and taking money from me for health insur. and AFLAC and not telling me he had already cancelled both policies)... they only cared that "I had willingly left a job", and labeled me "indefinitely ineligible"... so no help from them... or any other government place I called... I've even contacted lawyers about anything they could do to help, and they all asked for about $1000 to stop the eviction... damn if I had $1000 I'd be giving to my landlord, not you guys...
... I'm just fed up with my life... nothing went the way I wanted it to... I had wanted college and a good life... then I began with my own anxiety and panic problems... then my mother and grandmother who had raised me both went down with cancer... I had to quit school and work to support them, and then work to keep myself afterward, in any job I could take... I've never been able to drive or afford a car... haven't seen a doctor in decades...
... but I have a mind... sometimes I feel it's all I have left anymore... otherwise, I feel useless, I feel all my skills have left me... I can't even play guitar anymore after the hand damage I had at the bakery job from my boss' damn broken racks that would always break a wheel and fall over... I feel all I can do anymore is write, and maybe I don't even do that good anymore...
... well, I'm just trying to say my days here are limited... and I might be offline for a good while in the next few weeks... I'm trying to keep writing as long as I can, and keep posting my stuff... it might seem crazy in the midst of this all to worry about writing poetry, but it helps calm me down... otherwise my mind and body churn here all day, waiting for the next thing to happen... so I write what I can, and read...
... I don't know what's going to happen next... I just know I'm done taking any damn job that comes along to pay the bills... every boss I've had has taken advantage of me, just used me for their own benefit... and I took it, all those years, I took it... but no more, I've little left to lose, and I clung to those jobs in fear, cause I was always on my own after my family all passed away... if I ever do have another job I know I will not take any bullshit ever again, I'm not afraid to walk out like I used to be...
... just for the record, my boss at the caterers, where I was head cook for 6 years, and often worked 16 or more hour days cause when people would quit he'd never replace them (another thing that has happened at every job I've had - Bob, can you cover the extra work for a while? Sure... and then they just never hire anyone else)... this boss didn't give me a raise for three years during the time my mother was doing chemo and dying... when my mother died, and the taxes in our town went soaring and I was in trouble of losing the house I asked him for a raise... and he told me my raise was his letting me go with my mother to chemo... and yes, I did quit on the spot when I heard that - and why now, I was losing the house anyway... and before the bakery I worked for a few months at a Kenny Rogers restaurant, only to have the manager and district man. steal money from the safe and try to blame it on us asst. managers, and then one night they cleaned out the whole safe and ran off with the money, so the men who owned the franchises out here in NJ just closed down all the restaurants for good...
... is it something that happens to a person when they open a shop or store, that they turn evil and selfish? ... if I ever had the money to open my own place, would it happen to me? Would I turn and do such things to my employees?... I ask myself this a lot, because this is all I've seen... and I know it's not me, I'm a good worker... I show up early, I do my work, I only call out if I'm really, really sick, I don't drink or party... this last job at the bakery, getting up at 3:30am every day, I never did anything the night before... I blew off all kinds of parties, movies, concerts...basically I blew off having a life because I always knew I had to get up the next morning and wanted to be on time and rested...
... I'm sorry for the long, long post, my mind is just in turmoil... and I want to say all these things, because when I say I'm getting evicted and sick of working, I want people to know why... that I'm not some drunk, drugged out deadbeat... that I'm not lazy... but I want to work for myself from now on, doing what I want to do, what I care about doing... I don't know where this attitude is going to lead me, but I just can't live the way I did before, taking just anything that comes along just because I need to survive... I will f**king starve first, that's how mad and sick I am of it all... I'm really feeling broken at this point of my life... I keep telling myself I will be ok, but it's hard to believe that, lol... time will tell, that's all I can say...
... I have one friend who is taking some boxes of books, papers and CDs/DVDs for me, so I won't be losing everything... especially my papers, my poems, I want to make sure they're all safe, I have paper copies of everything I've written for the past 6 years, and I want that safe... and my books... I'm leaving a lot behind, but that's ok... I have a big suitcase I'm going to fill with books that I want to carry with me, and several blank notebooks so I can keep writing for a while... and a big duffle bag I can take a lot of clothes in... everything else stays, which sucks cause I'm going to lose my telescope, I haven't even been able to find anyone who would buy it from me, damn economy...
*sigh* this is going to be an adventure, I guess... but I just want people to know why this is happening, and where my mind is... maybe I'm going crazy, I don't know... it's just I've worked the last 21 years of my life with no vacations, no benefits, and where has it gotten me? Still poor, and now I'm 40...
... anyway, thank you, to anyone who read all this... for listening, whether you care or not... I just had to let all this out, even if it's just a warning that, if you read my poetry, I will be offline soon and I don't know for how long... but I'll try to write and post til that happens, to help keep me sane, hehe... I've hated this apartment anyway, the people fighting, selling drugs in the parking lot... I haven't been happy much here... well, writing this has calmed me down some... I'm going to make some waffles for breakfast... care to join me?
