A few last job interviews...., from the gates of hell - missed State opportunities - Fate Fairies - book version
This entry was posted on 12/27/2011 2:00 AM and is filed under Fate Fairies:Fate Fairies - book version.
Even before we had fully moved back to Wisconsin, at the behest of my Mom, I put in an application at the State employment office. After about eight months, my name must have floated to the top of the list and some calls came through to come interview at various State departments.
Before I chose a job at the State of Wisconsin, I elected to go through quite a few more interviews. I could see no down side in interviewing for as many as they threw at me. I rode down to UW-Whitewater to interview for a janitor job. This time it was in the daytime. There was one interviewer. He glowered off to the side the whole interview. He hinted that he had better things to do during his youth than join the military. It was a sure bet that after that exchange he was only going through the motions with my interview.
I got a call to go up to University Hospital and interview for a job putting rooms back together after patients moved out. The interviewer was a young women. She seemed surprised I had showed up. "Please start immediately," she said. She seemed so urgent. In those days I had no connection, interest, or motivation for the health care world. I kept thinking of my Dad. He had died next door to this hospital at the Veterans' Hospital. I declined the generous offer of day-time hours. This decision would often haunt me later as eventually I would work in heath care for 10 years - but not at University Hospital. It is now a "where would I be now moment," every time I think about that interview.
Then came not such an awful interview or lost-chance interview, but just a plain bizarre interview. It was to be a fire door monitor in a high rise dormitory complex at the University of Wisconsin's main campus in Madison. Again I interviewed in the middle of the night. The interviewer propped his feet up on his desk the whole time. He was a guy about my age with a scruffy unshaved face. His pants bagged a bit as if from decades of carrying heavy keys on his belt.
"All you have to do is lock and unlock security doors at designed times," he said as he rolled a cigarette. "Once in a while, the janitors are in another building and you might have to clean up some puke left by a drunk student in the hallway. Think you can carry keys day in and day out and mop up puke once a month? I know you can, you were in the Army Engineers during Vietnam. This is nothing strange to you."
"Actually, I was in Germany," I reminded him.
"Close enough, can you start tomorrow? he said and smiled.
Again in retrospect, my decision seems ludicrous. I politely declined believing I was worth more to society than wandering around with keys and an occasional puke mop. What the hell was I thinking? I was 36 years old. My body was already strained under the stress of 20 years of blue-collar labor. But no. No, I believed I should go back to the two jokers from the very first interview I had with the State. The impetus of my alleged genius - the jokers promised that I would be using dozens of sophisticated pieces of janitorial equipment. I figured I could come away with a rewarding experience in learning and tinkering with gadgets - something I used to love doing.
In retrospect, why did I believe two jokers? One an old fool with alcohol on his breath, the other a young rube. Both had interviewed me for 45 minutes in the middle of the night during their shift, and then forced me to prove I could read. They asked me to read the directions on a cleaning spray can. Why not do that first before the long interview? If I could not read, it would have saved a long useless interview. But, I did not pick up on what nit-wits they were. Thoroughly beat down by the night hours and the indignity of emptying waste baskets all night while being treated like a child, I would quit that job after only a few months.
Who knows? If I had taken the fire door monitor job perhaps you might still find me "up'ta da University" wandering around opening up and locking doors to this day - now with 20 years of benefits under my belt, still mopping up an occasional puke for posterity sake.
Note: This blog "Fate Fairies" - book version Category is a work in progress. The original vignettes are being edited for book form. Go to the Cooldadiomedia Web site and the Fate Fairies Page for an ordered chronology of the book vignettes (chapters).
