Phase 15: "Wiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiilson!!!!!!!!" or Life as a Castaway in the Sea of Unemployment

           Well here I am. I have just passed the four month mark of being unemployed and if you had to ask me what direction I think things are going, to be honest, I 'd have to look at you with that blank stare a teenager gives you when you ask them why they have failed a class…. "Uh…. I don't know."

So, as I was cleaning my garage, making room for my art-studio and expanding my home office - I am finding if I have some place to 'go' I seem to be more productive - I have been trying to come up with a new way to look at things, to process the feelings into some kind of form that I can share. As I was cleaning up I came across a book that I have had for a long time, "Desperate Journeys, Abandoned Souls - True Stories of Castaways and Other Survivors" Probably not the most uplifting thing to read in my current state, but I can relate in many ways to many of the stories.

I am adrift, therefore, in the sea of unemployment and my stores of hope, and visions of a rescue are dwindling. My mental life-raft is developing leaks and the sharks are once again circling making it hard to focus on the horizon of my future, as the encroaching needs of the present creep ever closer.

Some statistics to review; to date I have applied for 211 jobs, using 6 different on-line job search engines. This effort has netted me 63 rejection letters (all email by the way),  13 phone-interviews, 8 face-to-face first interviews, 3 face-to-face second interviews and no job offers.

Not only have I been using the new tools of job hunting - the internet. I have actually dressed up in job-hunting gear and gone out and hand delivered my resume to 30 companies, filled out another 10 applications at actual business sites (but this is becoming a rarity - more on that later) and attended one totally fruitless 'job-fair' - see Phase 13. I haven't been this depressed since the initial week of this adventure.

Closer to home, since I am not receiving unemployment (thanks to the way my previous employer left me hanging) so I had to cash in a retirement fund to keep things going while I continue the search. This economic store-house will not last long in my life raft, and I need to find some kind of revenue stream island to land on pretty quick or I might not last much longer out here in the Unemployment Ocean.

Much like the people in the book, as I drift, baking in the sun, with no wind to push the makeshift sail I have created with pasted together resumes, and cover letters, I have spent way too much time the past few weeks agonizing over what went wrong and how I ended up adrift in this leaky boat, floating in an unforgiving sea, and noting but fleeting glimpses of hope on the horizon. Self-pity and self-blame are two mighty strong impulses to shake.

I tire of casting the make-shift net of resumes into the water, only to continually come up empty handed. It seems like no matter which direction I cast (or how I tweak the resume or letter) it makes no difference, and of course,  employers NEVER give any feedback as to WHY you were not hired, if you get any feedback at all. Yet, like the castaway, I keep trying. I wonder sometimes what would happen if I would just quit. How long does it take to tumble into despair when a person has given up? I am gaining a much better understanding of those of us who have reached the government bench mark of 27 weeks - the long-term unemployed. I am at 18 now and counting.

  So, what does it feel like to be an employment castaway? Let's explore some more. As I have noted, I am past the initial period after being marooned in the ocean. The realization that someone might come to a quick rescue and reach out to me with a new job, quickly scooping me from the rough waters of unemployment has faded.

I have progressed past the point where I view this as some kind of adventure, that might last a while, I might get a good tan, and have some fun stories to tell when I get home, to the realization that I am probably screwed and am out her drifting on my own.

Realizing my plight, I have also been through the stage of 'Well, if you just sit here and do nothing, no one will ever find you!' Where I get real creative, I make a sun-shade out of an old blanket. I weave a net from threads pulled from the edges of cloth. I hoist a sail constructed out of remnants of cloths I happened to grab as I was cast away.

The time passes.

The sun gets no less intense.

The breezes of hope never come.

The storehouse of mental supplies dwindles.

…

…

What's that? Out there on the horizon? A flashing light of opportunity - an actual job offer? I blink, rub my sun-crusted eyes. No, it's a mirage, a fake, a come-on. So many of these false images are jobs that are available, IF you have $500 or $1000 to invest FIRST. Or, there MIGHT be a job AFTER a year of classes and training - that will cost you a huge chunk of supplies. I try very hard to understand the whole concept of PAYING to get a job OPPORTUNITY. How backward is that? So, once again, I settle back down into the leaky craft, that is slowly sinking… I know it is because I have been marking the economic waterline on the inside of my boat, trying to predict how much time I have left before I am clinging onto a single board, trying to beat away the sharks with  my bare hands. I have some time, how much I'm not sure. So as the hunger for money becomes more than a pang, I must keep casting out the net, trying to grab onto something.

The time passes.

The hunger does not diminish.

The net keeps coming back empty.

The boat sinks a little deeper into the sea.

…

…

Well, here we are then. Yet another crossroads in the journey. Do I give up the notion that I will be 'rescued' by a ship of traditional employment? Do I spend my time now weaving a new net, casting it in a different direction - one that seems to offer me hope? Though I am adrift, I am not without SOME skills. So, with a close eye on my dwindling provisions, and a wary eye on the horizon of opportunity, I will paddle forth in the hopes that I will come ashore somewhere, soon, and be able to live on to tell the story of my journey to others…