The Last Day on the Job

As the economic clusterfuck of unemployment, falling property values, crashing interest rates, doom and gloom, and labour market "liquidity" (the economy is soup and our jobs are chickpeas that have been boiled too long) all intersect to create this most global of recessions, it seems a good time to ruminate on perhaps one of the clearest markers of change in life - The Last Day on the Job. Appropriately enough, I write this while at "work" on the "last day" of the "job" I have been doing for that past eight months.

Yes, I too am a victim of the financial shitstorm. Now I don't really believe that for a second, but I am sure as hell going to spin in that way on my resume! I've been a temping at the phone company, New Zealand's largest employer, for about 7-8 months, and had pretty much no chance of getting a permanent job (reasons forthcoming in a separate post which will summarize a cultural and linguistic, uh, misunderstanding). A couple of weeks ago, my team had a deep and meaningful meeting with our boss, the boss's boss, and the boss's boss's boss. One could cut a doughnut out of the anticipation in the air (just like Shaggy and Scooby Doo did with fog) as we (or at least I) had never before spoken to the boss cubed (boss to the third power? grandmother boss? or should it be great-grandmother boss?) In what was honestly a professional although slightly condescending presentation, the boss (to the first power) told us that the outsourcing project to the Philippines is ongoing and our team is likely to be moved. Boss #3 reminded us of our "ownership" over our own careers, and calmly suggested that right about now is the time to investigate one's options. So I did, or continued to do so; I hadn't stopped looking for a job ever since landing in New Zealand 8 months ago. But instead of applying for jobs I had no hope in hell of getting (drama teacher at prestigious girls' college, travelling Lotto salesman, plant operator at orange juice factory, life skills tutor in a freaking PRISON), I started to take things more seriously and applied for jobs I was actually qualified to do, which in my case are teaching English and fronting a rock and roll band without hair.

I start teaching tomorrow.

By my calculations, today marks the 15th time I've had a last day on the job. Of the 15, I only remember five, and that includes today. And yes, they are the last four jobs I've had, plus one I had during my teenage years at the British Market, a wee store in the Rice University Village (cozy outdoor mall type area in Houston) where I worked with partner in crime and BFF Ashley (who, despite being someone's BFF and being named Ashley, is a dude). This last day on the job was memorable only for its "going out in a blaze of glory" denoument - as a rather fat woman nervously fired Ashley and I for confusing shifts and leaving the store unattended the previous Sunday, I told her to "suck my ass" as we left the back room. Suffice it to say that burning bridges wasn't something I was all too worried about in those days.

My last day at Jishukan School (two years of my professional life wasted on spoiled rich Japanese kids) was typically anti-climactic, but I do vividly remember the chairman of the English department, a Mr. Suzuki (nicknamed Lizard King because of his resemblance to Jim Morrison) coming over to me and apologizing for how bad the third year students had been. It was the first time he had spoken to me in months. Lizard King, like most of the teachers at Jishukan, avoided Mike (the other white man at the school) and I like the plague. I'll never forget saying, "Happy New Year," only to have the Lizard stare back at me to respond, "It's too late." This was on my first day back at school after the New Year holiday, on January 12.

The longest job I ever had, a six year stint at a language school in Japan, ended sometime in March 2006, but I have no recollection of the last day at all. My in-laws were visiting at the time, and I all I can remember is the excitement of starting the new job at Jishukan (I hadn't met the Lizard yet). I was a history teacher for two years back in Houston, but don't even remember the last semester, much less the last day. I worked in my university's writing lab for three years or so, and I don't work there currently, so clearly there was a last day, but I'll be damned if I can remember any of it, and likewise with the job at the pizza parlour, the art gallery, the library, and the office supply deliveries.

Moral of the story? The last day of the job is textbook positive psychology. We don't remember the last day on the job because the last day on the job is the really the first day of whatever comes next. Our memories of the last day are intrinsically intertwined with what came next, even if the "next" was a period of unemployed, self loathing, self-medicated promiscuity (or at least attempted promiscuity). So ask me a year from now, and I won't remember a thing about my last day at the phone company.

Unless I tell the lady in the next cubicle to suck my ass.