Letter to a Candidate

... Do it wisely. Make a difference.

Dear Candidate,

You stand before me now in fear. anxiety and confusion. Much the way I stood before you not so very long ago.

Do you remember the look you tried so desperately to convey? Do you remember how you tried so hard to convince me that you cared? That it wasn't you who made this choice but the "others" that you could not question. How naive you must have thought me.

Now you and others like you stand before me and others like me to plead to keep your lifestyle. You continue to believe you have nothing to do with the starving people in the streets. Nothing to do with the families torn apart by unemployment and homelessness. Nothing to do with the early deaths of children and the elderly.

We elected you to do a job -- Speak for us. You chose instead to murder us. You chose to ban with those who share your greed. Now you and your friends are paranoid. But it isn't paranoia when someone is really out to get you. We are out to get you. We will get you -- in the voting booths across America. We will bring you down and we will learn. Learn not to leave a man in office longer than eight years. Because we know, after man is elected he starts to owe the "others".

From this point on we will give you eight years -- four to try and four to make the change. After that, you're on your own. Get a job. Plan your retirement. Find a reasonable healthcare plan. In other words, live the way we live. If you've worked hard, paid taxes, and invested in your future you should be fine -- as long as the bankers, CEOs, investment wizards and politicians don't take it all.

Yours truly,

The American Voter

Occupy America

This appears on another of my blogs today as part of Taking a Stand.

The end was closing in; the signs were all there. She'd seen this all play out so many times. The rally of energy, the smiles, the jokes and the way things appeared to be getting better. She recognized the signs. The end was close.

She'd worked all her life. She didn't know any other way. Parochial school didn't prepare a girl for much back then.  There was the convent or the marriage. Neither suited her. She entered the world blind and naive. So many mistakes but few regrets and never thinking of giving up. Not until now. Now she was tired and beaten and again unprepared.

She paid her taxes and invested in her plan to retire. Then it all blew up. The bankers and investment gurus stole everything, got richer, stayed richer and ridiculed those from whom they stole. When their own bags began to split, off to the politicians they ran telling them they must convince the victims to bail them out and pay their bills. Make the victims take care of the thieves  families in the way they had become accustomed.  It was one of the few times the politicians agreed. There were no party lines, only blatant greed.

 For the first time in her life there were no jobs In loosely disguised words, they said she was too old. "Too experienced" they called it. The fat politicians told the world the jobs were there but she was too lazy to work and too greedy to take less. They called their job fair a success. Thirty companies came with a total of 1100 hundred jobs to fill. The jobs were pretty basic. The young, old and lazy were surprised to learn there were 3 to 30 applicants for each opening. Few really were hired but the media lauded the success of the fair.

Time went on and the old lazy woman ran out of benefits. She took early retirement. The politicians criticized her. How dare she ask for the money she paid into this program meant to help in her later years. She took the money anyway. It was barely enough to exist -- a little over $600 per month to cover everything.  She kept smiling and she kept looking.

After three years (and three months) she found a part time job. She celebrated by crying. She started to figure how to turn the gas back on for winter were only a few weeks off.

Then it all fell apart again. No one seemed to know who withdrew the money or why no one could trace it. But there it was $179 to some cyber crook. The rent bounced. The fees mounted.  Now she found herself with a job, a small retirement check and no place to live.

Living longer was no blessing and she knew the politicians, the same ones who kept getting fatter while she starved, were doing all they could to shorten her life span. She was very cold and very tired and very hungry. Sleep would be the true blessing. Finally, she gave up.

Job Research

First I apologize for being so late with this post. The wall charger cord to my rusty laptop died without warning. I had to find the time and the money to get a new one. Also, I started a killer job -- that isn't killer as in wonderful, it's killer as in physically killing but a job is a jo after three years of looking -- and I had to get used to not working from a sitting position which is how I've done it for the last 20 years. Again I apologize.

All of these Wall Street demonstrations are sure giving the politicians something to talk about criticize. The thing is they just don't get it. They keep saing the jobs are there and people are going back to work every day. All true of course. Politicians also say that we must be satisfied to set our sights n a lower pay check because business is suffering and can't afford to overpay us they way we ave become accustomed. I won't get into that because if you are a reader here you already know that's bull and if you don't believe it  I'm not going to change your mind in one sentence. I just want you to take a little job hunting walk with me in our mind using places in your own neighborhood. Let's use a major pharmacy chain.

Picture your choice in your mind.  Think about the clerks associates. See If they are like the chains in my area they fall into three categories:

1) young, first job, student

2) late 20s, early 30s moms with kids in school

3) older, retired or semi-retired, may also be a first job.

There's a reason why these people were hired -- experience, or rather lack of experience in this particular field. Why do you think in those TV interviews the unemployed always say they "can't find work in my field"? Because of experience that's why!

People with experience cost more. They are also presumed a threat to the jobs of those with less experience. It's natural to feel inferior to those who have actually done the job, solved the problems. Those who know that even textbooks have happy endings and life doesn't always.

It took me three years to get a job, any job, because I had to learn to apply in areas where I have the least experience and where no one in their right mind would think I wanted to move up or show anyone up.

The next time you go into a chain look at how the associates are aging before your eyes.

A final note, there is no standard one size fits all resume. I had to customize for each position before any offers started.

See you soon