JOBS

 I found the Alien C.W. picking my new guitar when I arose and went to my "music room" this morning. You won't believe what I saw. He had chosen the shape of a country singer and was belting out a marvelously weird rendition of the old standard "Working Man Blues."

He stopped when I walked in. "Tell me something, Slick," he said.

"I told you once not to call me that."

"Oh yeah, I forgot, Hotshot."

I ignored him. "Put that guitar down, I had to lie to the Commanding Officer about how much it cost. It's not for you to destroy."

He returned it tot the case. "Tell me something, Sport."

"As in, what?"

"Hit's Fridee, ain't it? trrying his best to imitate a southern drawl.

"All day."

"Why do your people hate their jobs so much that they only live for Fridays?"

"Not all of them do."

"Then let's you and I write a song titled, "I Love My Job" and see how it sells."

He had me there. "Don't you have something to do?"

"I'm doing it. It's called 'research.' You ought to try it sometime."

"Tell that to the Magahatters."

"They hate their jobs the most, don't they?"

I sensed a rocky road ahead. "Do Falloonians love their jobs?"

"You wouldn't understand. Why don't employers make the jobs more fun?"

"I don't know. Profits I suppose."

"But look," he said, pulling a worn and dusty book from a table, "This says that happy workers produce more."

"I'm going to leave you to your research now."

"Good," he said. "I'm working on another hit."

"I don't think that's a good idea," I said. "You had the Political Correctness Police descending on us with your last."

"This one's different," he said. "It's called 'How You Gonna Walk Straight With This Job Up Your A…?

"Stop it," I said.

"Asset account," he said. "What?"

I walked out, closed the door, and went for breakfast, walking straight as I could.

The Blues

Dear Friends and Followers: I found Big Dope asleep at this computer this morning and the following was on it. I snuck in beside him and posted it before he woke up. Enjoy!

 I recall a man I worked with on my first full time day job as “filling-station” attendant. His name, I seem to remember, was Calvin and he was probably in his thirties with a family. His job was washing cars. He didn’t own one himself. He walked home and back for dinner (lunch) and one day he was five minutes late getting back, so the boss, a real Arkansas a**hole, fired him. Being late was just an excuse. The real reason? He was “uppity.” Didn’t show proper respect for his “betters.” I’ve never been able to erase the sight of him as he walked back toward home with his hands in his pockets and his head sunk into his shoulders.

I don’t imagine Calvin ever sang the blues. A person could get fired for doing that as well.

I also recall the “cotton-choppers” that traded at my father’s little country grocery store. A truck with a covered bed would pick them up before daylight to take them to the fields. They would stop at our store and buy food to eat at noon. Then, after chopping all day, they would stop back by after dark and get something for supper and, if there was enough money left, breakfast.

This went on until the crops were laid by. I don’t know what they did for food until it was time to pick the cotton.

I’ll admit I never heard them sing the blues. I never heard them sing at all. They were too tired.

I do know that I have heard stories about this farmer and that one who would “short” them on pay and laugh about it for the victims had no recourse for justice. Maybe they did sing the blues in the quiet and safety of their own homes.

I also know they led a wretched, oppressed life in which they couldn’t drink from a white water fountain, use a public restroom, send their children to a decent school, or—oftentimes—vote.

From what I understand, it must have been
those poor black folks up north that sang
 the blues. Those in the south were happy
 with their lot. Saw that on Fox News. - C.W.

I do know that anyone who would believe they chose such a life would be ignorant enough to believe that we choose our sexuality, or that we should be either rewarded or punished for it.

I do know that these experiences caused me to try to lead a life that would attend to the poor in spirit and the downtrodden and to be wary of those who worship riches too much, whether they be hedge-fund managers, corporate executives, or televangelists. I’ve also remained aware of the many unearned benefits resulting from enough northern-European DNA to have me classified as “Caucasian.”

 

Maybe that’s why I don’t watch reality TV shows about rednecks. Nor do I pay much attention to what they say or think, unless they say something that is really, really, stupid. Then it makes me remember all the Calvins I have known. All the a**holes, too.

Buses

Hey folks. This is the Alien C.W. with his “Observation of the Week” while Big Dope is in the shower thawing out.

It is a cold damp day here, with a winter storm approaching. Big Dope decided he had to go walking as he must face the Commandant of Weight Control at the veteran’s hospital soon. And … he decided that it would be a more pleasant outing if I accompanied him.

 Or, as he put it, “Get your three asses out of bed. We’re going walking.”

I protested until he threatened to delete my collection of Kaley Cuoco photos from his computer. What could I do?

It was threatening rain, so we decided to stay close to the man/alien cave. Rain doesn’t bother me, but he assures me that, as a member of your species, he would melt if exposed. We decided to circle the park across the street, it being a mile in perimeter and we could count our laps.

I assumed a shape similar to his and we started out. The sun wasn’t up, and we walked along the park with our hoodies drawn, unarmed and innocent, enjoying happy thoughts—a perfect urban tableau.

Or, as the men and women on Fox News would say, “Hunting Season.”

As we reached an unlighted area, a figure suddenly emerged and said, “Good morning” in a loud voice. It scared the Gutotamibodequeece++ out of me. (Editor’s note: You don’t want to know).

Actually, it was just a lady from the apartments across the street. We see her quite often. She was waiting to catch the bus to go to work, probably for some rich family in the western edge of our city.

Anyway, we talked about fact that it would probably take her an hour, with transfers and all, to arrive at her destination. If she makes any purchases along the way, she will pay a new sales tax on the goods. The money will go to our state’s Highway Construction Department and it will use the money to build new freeways from our city to cities that would not allow “her kind” to live in them, except perhaps as a voucher that can be exchanged for goods or services. (Editor’s note: He means “token.” His translator is out of synch again).

Big Dope got quiet at this point. I think this sort of thing bothers him more than it does some of your species. We walked in silence for an entire lap.

Finally, as we headed north around the eastern edge of the park, the first preliminary blast of cold wind hit us and took our breath away. Well, his breath, I have a different sort of respiratory system.

I guess if these folks would just buy themselves
cars, it would be easier to get around. - C.W.

To get our mind off the cold, I began to express my confusion at your species’ insistence on utilizing the most inefficient methods of transportation in the galaxy. I further expressed my opinion that the poor might become more productive if they had better methods of getting to work. Big Dope turned and explained it this way.

“Shut the hell up and keep walking.”

So I did. We turned west along the north edge of the park, the part that borders a major street. Just as we did, a van stopped alongside us and a pleasant looking woman asked if she could give me a pamphlet. I said yes and she did.

As she drove away, I glanced at the title.

“God controls the world,” it said.

46. Teachers

We enjoy an early spring in our state as a recompense for brutal summers and mercurial winters. So I was enjoying one and visiting, in my mind, a place far away in a time equally distant. I was aware that someone had taken the seat next to mine on the park bench where I sat. But I paid no attention until I felt a poke in my side and someone said, “You always did daydream a lot.”

I looked, and was startled to see, looking me over as if I were a newly captured criminal, my fifth-grade teacher, Miss Edith Rupe. Well, of course it was C.W., but the resemblance was so uncanny that I allowed myself to be transported back to 1953. It felt strangely comfortable, but then I am a white male.

“Do you remember me?” she said.

“Oh yes, you were everyone’s favorite.”

“Do you remember where I lived?”

“Yes, in a boarding house on Sixth Street.”

“From where I walked the eight blocks or so to work.”

“You never had a car?”

“Do you think a teacher in those days could afford a car?”

“What a about the bus?”

“I saved bus fare so I could have a parakeet—my only luxury.”

“Yes, I seem to remember when it died. Petey, or something like that was its name.”

“Something like that. It was a lonely time.”

“Did you have a good life?”

“What do you think?” She—it—leaned back on the bench and looked wistfully toward the river. “How good a life do you think an ‘old-maid’ had on a teacher’s pay in the 1950s?”

“Well, you were good at it”

She just looked at me as if I had passed wind or something.

“I mean, several people I know, who you taught …”

“Whom I taught.”

“Whom you taught, have done quite well. I know one, a stockbroker now, who made nearly a million dollars a year before he retired.”

“Yes, that made it all worthwhile.”

I looked to see if I could detect irony. Nothing. Just sadness.

“We all did a good job considering,” she said. “Teachers still do, don’t they?”

“Oh yes, and under very tough circumstances.”

“Then tell me something.” It was C.W. talking now.

“What?”

“Why are your leaders trying to take teachers back to the conditions that existed in the old days? Don’t they respect them at all?”

“Well, some do.”

“What about the others?”

“Well, they seem to think things would be better with private schools, or even better with religious ones.”

“After what some of their leaders have been doing to those young boys?”

“Well, in some cases their thinking may be a little behind …” I stopped and flushed a crimson red.

Not Miss Rupe, but I did get your attention, right? - C.W,

Fortunately for me, Miss Rupe interrupted. “Before you buy into that “private school” thing, can I ask you a question?”

“Sure.” I was glad to change the subject.

“Did I ever teach you about a concept called ‘Cherry-picking’”?

I thought. “That is … when …”

“That is when you provide excellent service to those to whom it is profitable to provide excellent service—usually the rich—and let those to whom it is unprofitable to provide service—usually the poor—fend for themselves.”

32. Indifference

C.W. and I were sitting on our balcony watching the sun sink over western Little Rock. Its rays combined with the ozone layer to produce a marvelous sight—physics and nature in a whirlwind of jagged colors. He whacked the railing with his “thumping stick” and regarded the sights our planet can produce.

He was in the form of a service station worker, complete with an insignia of a long-forgotten oil company. I would guess his assumed age at about 18.

“Where have you been?” I said. I guessed that he had been “enphasing” as he calls it—going back in time to revisit life in the past.

“Working in a service station in your hometown back in 1960,” he said. “Just a temporary job parking cars during the holiday season.”

“Seeing anything interesting?”

“Not much. Just observing how much calmer things were back then.” He paused and whacked the balcony again. “Oh we did fire somebody yesterday … that is the two bosses fired this colored man.”

“Don’t call people that,” I said. “Why did they fire him?”

“He didn’t call one of them sir, or something. They said he was a smart aleck.”

“Is that all?”

“Well he was a couple of minutes late coming back from dinner.”

“You mean lunch?”

“We call it dinner. Anyway, they said they wasn’t going to pay some smart assed ni…”

“That’s enough!”

“They wasn’t going to pay somebody like him 50 cents an hour and have to put up with his disrespect.”

“So they just fired him?”

“Well, he had to walk home every day for dinner since there wasn’t a place downtown for him to eat. He evidently lived way over on the east side and sometimes he was a few minutes late getting back.” He whacked the balcony again.

“So they fired him,” I said. “For being two minutes late?”

“Yep. Kinda sad seeing him turn around and head back home. Guess his wife was pretty disappointed when she found out.”

“Did you try to help?” I asked.

“Wasn’t none of my business,” he said.

“Hmmm.”

He whacked once more and turned to me. “Did you ever help one of them back then?”

“No, I lacked the courage.” I paused and offered, though I know it was weak. “I never knowingly mistreated anybody of any color, though.”

“I see,” he said. “You know, your species has made an art form out of indifference.” He whacked the balcony.

“Careful,” I said. “You’ll chip the paint.”

The opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference.
And the opposite of life is not death, it's indifference. Elie Wiesel

“I just keep thinking about that man walking back to his family.” He stared at the city. “Well, got to go.”

“Where?”

“Got to select a shape for the peace march Saturday.”

“It’s been cancelled,” I said. “Not enough interest.”

“Crap,” he said, whacking my balcony rail again.

31. Gratitude

Those behind me in line reacted to the smell before I did. We were at one of those fancy fast-food restaurants with a “snake-through” line and I was about to order a cheeseburger with fries when I noticed it. I turned and saw a man in a working uniform being stared down by everyone around him. His shirt announced that he was a city wastewater department employee and, to put it mildly, he was gamey.


I purchased my food and sat as far from the line as possible. The entire place was buzzing and those in line formed a three-foot gap on either side as they moved slowly through the process of getting their lunch. Even the clerk at the ordering register couldn’t suppress a grimace as the poor fellow went through.

I resolved not to think about it and bent over my food. But then I noticed a figure standing over me and I almost gagged from the spell. It was the smelly man.

“May I join you mister?” he said. “All the other tables seem to be full.”

I looked around. Sure enough, the place was packed and whatever seats were vacant had suddenly been filled with packages, coats, or even empty food trays. Before I could answer, he sat across from me and began unwrapping his food.

“Thanks,” he said. “I’m starving.” He began to devour his burger and I pushed mine away.

“If you don’t want the rest of that, I’ll take it,” he said, and flashed me a smile.

Crapola. It was C.W.

“What the hell are you doing?” I fairly hissed it out.

“Whatschew mean?” he mumbled through a mouth of food.

“You smell awful.”

“You would to if you had my job.”

“Dammit. You don’t have a job. What are you trying to prove?”

“I’m not trying to prove anything. Just testing your species on gratitude and honesty.”

“Honesty?”

“Yep. I been reading the newspapers and couldn’t help notice all the politicians braying on about doing something for the common working man. So I’m running some tests.”

“By ruining everyone’s lunch?”

“You mean you don’t think resolving problems involving the sanitary collection and disposal of wastewater represents an honest endeavor?”

I chewed on a fry and thought. “Well, sure,” I said.

“You just don’t want to be reminded of it,” he said.

“Maybe not during lunch.”

“When then?”

“When the problem arises.”

“I see,” he said. “A necessary evil, that’s all I am?” He ate silently for a moment and then looked up with hurt in his eyes. “You know, I learned this morning that your newspaper editor doesn’t even believe I deserve a pay raise this year.” He said it loudly enough for the whole room to hear.

Would serve them right as far as I'm concerned. - C.W.

I wanted to crawl under the table. I’m not sure the embarrassment was for me, personally or for, as he puts it, “my species.”

“Oh well, he said. “I’ll get by,” and he took another bite of food. “It’s a pretty easy job if you can remember one thing.”

“I’m all ears.”

“You have to remember not to bite your nails unless you’ve been wearing gloves.”

13. Labor Day

Ah, nice weather, prospects for a long weekend. I’m gathering things to take to join my wife for a weekend at the farm. As I am waiting for some laundry to finish, a knock comes at the door. I open it to find what? Of all things, I find an oriental figure in a Chinese Coolie outfit, bent slightly with arms clasped under his chin and head bowed.

“Ni houma, hau boohau,” he said, or something like that. Then: “Prease to arrow in?”

It had to be. “C. W.?” I said.

“Thought I fool honorable friend,” it said, gliding past me. I couldn’t help noticing a long pigtail falling down his back.

“What’s going on?” I said. “I was just getting ready to leave.”

“Ah, not to disturb. Want to wish Happy Rabor Day.”

C. W., would you cut the shit?” I said.

He looked up at me with a hurt expression. “Why so angry? No rike rong weekend?”

I resumed packing.

“Why does your species work so hard?” he finally asked in a normal voice.

“It is our curse, I suppose.”

“Curse or choice?”

A person has to eat and have a roof over his head.”

He sat and arranged his flowing gown. “Not take much time work to provide that.” He was back in his faked accent.

“Forty hours a week or more.”

Another change of voice: “Wrong, I calculate much less. Maybe half, Why not spend the rest of the time helping the distadvantaged and needy and then imagining and thinking how to make world a better place?”

“We call that Communism.”

“Ah, my mistake, I thought you call Christianity.”

I just looked at him as if to say, “How stupid.”

“You know about first Rair-road across country?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Who build?”

I was getting tired of this, so I mimicked a redneck conservative. “Muricans, by God.”

“Ah, not so. Mostly Chinese immigrants. Do all dangerous work. Brast and chip through mountains hanging from baskets. Make one foot progress per day through sorrid granite. More than one thousand roose rives.”

“Okay, and we are all grateful.” He was badly getting on my last nerve.

“Just a couple more questions, Jocko.” Here was the old C.W.

“Yes?”

“How many times in your country’s great economic history have you produced great things without the use of free, slave, or below-living wage labor?”

I didn’t feel like playing his game. “Look,” I said. “My parents were sharecroppers during the Great Depression. Don’t blame me for slave labor.”

“Not brame,” he said, shifting back to his impression of coolie talk. “Make try to understand.”

“Understand this,” I said, extending a middle finger.

C.W. asks: "What's missing from this picture?

“Okay,” he said. “Another question.”

“One more, and that’s it.”

“Your country cerebrate working people this weekend. True?”

“Yes.”

“Working people take day off from rabors, right.”

“Right.”

“Everyone honor honest rabor.”

“Right.”

“Then why bankers off too?”

Well, hell. How was I supposed to know?