The Recession in my Wallet

Well, the inevitable has occurred: the greedy bastard who runs the book company I work for has reduced our hours. I'll be losing close to $100/month, which isn't pennies, especially as they just raised our health care premium. I'm lucky, I know, that this is as far as the recession's tentacles have reached into my life (thus far). But it is nevertheless frustrating and scary to know that the security of our financial future lies in one man's determination of how well books are selling.

I'm trying to look at this with a glass is half-full attitude. For example, I'll have a little more time now to research gluten-free baking, which I'm really enjoying. Sometimes I think I would be much happier if I'd studied baking instead of English and Jewish Studies. Mixing and shaping wheat breads, and doing all of the food science necessary for gluten-free baking, is really physically and emotionally satisfying--even when gluten-free pastries emerge from the oven and spontaneously deconstruct into sorry crumbles. (Damn you, rice flour!) Besides, I like getting up early in the morning and having my afternoons off. I like fussing around the kitchen and wrapping myself in cooking smells. Baking probably pays as well as what I do now, and the physical labor can't be much worse. And people will always need bread; books are a luxury, but bread is forever.

But instead I was seduced by academia, and here I am: bedraggled adjunct professor and bookstore peon, now on a temporarily reduced schedule due to the American consumer's new found fiscal responsibility. Which reminds me of one last thing, before I get ready for my day at the warehouse. Us bookstore employees listen to a lot of NPR, and I'm getting really tired of Nancy Pelosi's shrill and disingenuous appeals to the American public. Perhaps if the Democrats and Republicans took a day off from bullying each other, they might have the time to focus on real problems like unemployment numbers and, oh I don't know, the national budget. Or the fact that our new president, who I like immensely, but am in intense disagreement with, is ramping up another never-ending war in a Muslim country. I don't understand why our politicians are engaging in party assassinations at a time when they absolutely have to work together to help their constituents; how do they justify this behavior to themselves as they go to sleep each night?

I teach my students--and I will go to my grave believing fervently in the truth of this--that argument is for the purpose of reconciliation and solution. We don't argue to be assholes. We exchange conflicting ideas in the hope of salvaging peace, and establishing well being.

Our Congress needs to remember that its job is to reestablish well being in an ailing nation. So that we can all get this recession out of our wallets, and start living up to our potential.