This is not what I had in mind. I was told that if I went to college, studied hard, got a good GPA that it wouldn’t matter what my major was. I just needed that piece of paper and upon graduation; the world would become my oyster. I would open it take the pearl inside and then slide its briny squishy meat down my gullet. If I then went on to graduate schools and got a Master’s degree, the world would be my oyster farm with morning pearl dives and afternoon bourbon cocktails. This isn’t what happened: neither the metaphor nor the reality.
I was one of those kids for whom school was easy. I never seemed to have to work all that hard. I chose an easy major, History at a top 20 university. People told me, “Just major in something you like, it’s the diploma that matters.” Even if I goofed off for a semester, I could figure out a way to at least get a B in almost any history class. I love history and I was willing to participate in class, so professors loved me.
I worked all throughout college, unlike many of my colleagues whose daddy would send cash in the mail once a week that would usually end up packed in a bowl or shot-gunned in a parking lot. I officiated intramural sports and even started scheduling leagues by my senior year. I was lucky enough to obtain a graduate assistantship at another top research university. They would pay me a stipend and pay for my graduate education as long as I ran their intramural program. Again, they told me, “As long as you work, you can major in whatever you want.” Didn’t matter, I’d be 23 years old and have a Master’s degree at graduation. Baller.
I majored in Public and International Affairs in graduate school. Half of my classes were political theory; the other half involved learning about Structural Adjustment Programs, the IMF, and the World Bank and how corporations really controlled the world. I read Confessions of an Economic Hitman and understood every single word. My mind was open. I was finally able to bask in my nerdiness for history and politics and everyone around me was the same way. I learned more about myself and about the world in two years of graduate school than I did in the previous 16 years of American education.
Then the Great Recession came. I remember sitting in a Theory of Political Economy class and the professor just spitting truth for three straight hours about what just happened. I still thought I’d be fine. After all, I would have a MASTER’S degree. It became evident soon after graduation, however, that the world of paying jobs had very little need for 23 year-old with two humanities degrees and no extramural work experience.
I can’t recall how many dozens, or possibly hundreds, of jobs I applied for after graduation. USAjobs.com might as well have been my homepage. Why wouldn’t the government want ME? I’m smart, liberal and willing to accept little money to serve the public. Idealist.org was my second-favorite website. Again, smart, liberal and willing to do dog work for the poor and oppressed. I had a Master’s degree goddammit and I had worked my tits off for it.
That’s when it hit me. I was being an entitled little prick. I thought the world owed me something because I had lived in southwest Virginia for two years and had fellow white students comfortably use the word “nigger” around me when describing then-Senator Barack Obama. I’m from New Jersey, and that shit wasn’t cool. My liberal ears had heard “nigger” in a non-Wu-Tang format so, of course, the world owed me one.
No matter what, no one is entitled to anything. It took me way too long to realize that and that’s probably why I am where I am today. I knew I needed to do something different and that I needed to work my ass off to make any money and get ahead in the world. No piece of paper can do that for you. College is such a sheltered environment that you start to think that that’s how the world is. If the world was a college campus….well, that’d be pretty fucking sweet.
I should have known better. I read about people in Guatemala being sold out by their government to US companies like Halliburton and General Dynamics. The world doesn’t give a damn for them, so why should the world give a damn about me? And anyways, I needed a job. Having a long-distance girlfriend and living in your parents’ attic does not make for sexy time. I needed a paycheck and I needed to get the fuck out of my parents’ house. So I took the first job I could; barista at a gelato store in Arlington, VA. I was 25. My first shift was with two girls; a junior and a senior in high school (read: Fuck My Life).
After a few months at the gelato shop, I got a second job at another restaurant. For a time I was working 60 hours a week and 15 hours days on the weekends. It sucked and I was getting $8.00 per hour at each place. I had moved in with my girlfriend and knew that she was the one. I saved my tips for 6 months to do the right thing and marry her. Asking her parents for her hand in marriage was one of the most humbling things I’ve ever done. The fact that they agreed to have a 26-year-old barista making just-above minimum wage marry their daughter will forever baffle me.
I got a full-time job at the other restaurant (which shall remain nameless because I still work there) and quit the gelato shop. When I quite, the owner called me a “shady motherfucker” for giving two-weeks notice and told me never to come crying to him for anything. I said I wouldn’t. I moved up at the other restaurant. I was just a barista to start, but I got good at it. I can still make fancy latte art. I’m also hard working and trustworthy so I was made manager. After a year of busting my ass doing that, I got promoted again to General Manager. I’m salaried now and don’t rely on tips, but I work 55-60 hours a week and my paycheck never changes.
I make a lot less money than a lot of the people I serve on a daily basis who are the same age, or younger, than me. That’s the hardest part. When I am forced to ask someone younger than me if they’d like to add chicken or shrimp to their salad, I hate myself a little inside. I see the look on their face; the look like I’m some type of failure because I have a wedding ring on my finger and a beard on my face and I’m upselling a fucking salad.
That’s all in my head and I know it. No one orders food in a restaurant and considers the life and times of the server. I feel that way because I feel like a failure sometimes. I did exactly what people my age were told: do well in high school, get a high SAT score, do well in college, get a high GPA, get a Master’s. And yet my life is marginally better than if I had just started working in the service industry right out of high school. Some days I come home to an empty fridge and a low-balance alert and my frustration is unbearable. I hate waking up early, coming home late, taking shit from customers and the fuck-ups with whom I work. I took the conventional path but now I work with ex-cons and addicts.
This is not what I had in mind. This is not what any of us had in mind. Things are pretty shitty for my generation and it’s not totally our fault. Sure, we can be a bunch of whiny assholes sometimes, but no one under 30 invented derivatives and convinced people to buy mortgage-backed securities and credit default swaps. No one under 30 decided to bail out the banks. But, this is our shitty time. Our parents had the 70s and 80s. Our grandparents had the Great Depression. They all got through it and they were the better for it. I’ll be the better for upselling those salads and you’ll be better for working whatever shit job you have to go to tomorrow. We’ll always be better tippers than people who got some cushy job straight out of college. We’re down with the struggle. And our oysters will always taste sweeter.
I legit just applauded. And I do have to go to my shitty job tomorrow. But I’m still waiting on the sweet ass oysters. And you should be a teacher. You’d be a damn good one.
Need help with my house
Hello, I couldn’t find a contact form on the blog, and I didn’t want to appear spam but if you still actively blog, it would be interesting to see your mindset today. I recently wrote an article about Millenials and the impact of technology. You can find that article at https://vincenttriola.com/blogs/nonfiction-social-commentary-essays/the-second-lost-generation I am looking to follow that article with a discussion about Millenials and career. Your blog seems to stop at 2013 so it would be great to hear your progress. Thank you.
Hey fag