Decline and Fall: a tale of unemployment (part 3)

Janet’s world had completely fallen apart and she was very much aware of the fact. In the space of six months she’d gone from being someone totally at ease with the world, going to work and complaining about it, caught up in the rush of life and not given to thinking too much, to being someone on the fringes of society, jobless, isolated and alone, seemingly having no friends, wondering what on earth to do with her life, philosophising, completely out of harmony with the rest of the world, and getting depressed and worked up about society and the media.

It was a complete transformation. She spent her days doing nothing but watching telly, reading the news or going on the internet. Her whole life had been drastically altered when she’d quit her job and that was now clear as day. At the time she had been unable to see this. But now it was obvious. A job may only be a job, it may be boring, futile and dead end, but somehow it was the cornerstone of everything, and if you suddenly lost it, as she had, your whole life gaped meaningless before you and you suddenly started questioning everything and wondering what the hell life was about.

She had hated her job. Or so she had always said. It was dull, boring and awful. And when you worked you felt as if you were giving up your life, you were throwing away happiness all for the sake of it. It was depressing enough in winter when you had to get out of bed in the cold, dark morning and take yourself off to work half asleep, skimping on beauty sleep and looking haggard and careworn. But it was even more depressing in summer, when on a beautiful hot afternoon, when everyone was outside having fun, you had to remain indoors, missing the best part of the day, sweaty and irritable and choking with misery and boredom, sick to the hilt and losing the will to live. Yet it was a job.

And what mattered in life? That was easy or so she used to think. It was happiness, it was having fun, it was friends and family, it was love and romance, or it was joy; or it was being entertained or enjoying oneself, or it was caring for people and being cared for. And yet in fact none of these things were possible without work, without a job. She couldn’t really accept that conclusion yet it was true. That banal misery work, that was somehow the glue that held all the rest together. Without work you couldn’t really ever have the rest. It was somehow the foundation, the cornerstone, the platform on which to build the others. If you didn’t go to work then you were cut out of society and unable to appreciate all that was good in life.

She thought back to her old work days. Eight hours a day, five days a week! In fact if you added in the time to get ready and get to work, and then the time to get home in the evening it was more like ten! Ten hours from every day stolen! Ten hours of your life wasted. Ten hours of misery and doom. And yet, if you did those ten hours that still left six hours in the evening all for yourself. Six precious hours! They were yours. You had bought them, earned them, fought tooth and nail for them. No one could take them away from you. You could watch telly or even rent a film. You could have a long, hot, relaxing bubble bath with a glass of sherry in your hand and the radio on, or you could go out for a drink with your friends, go to the pub for some atmosphere, go for a meal, go to the cinema, socialise! Oh how lovely it had been to socialise after a days work!

And you had money in your pocket to spend. You could buy yourself a new dress say, cheer yourself up by purchasing a cappuccino maker or a fondue set, some charming little piece of pottery or some fancy knick-knacks. It was one of life’s little pleasures. And you could go on holiday as well, and feel you’d earned it. Even if it was just a little overnight stay somewhere, a day out to Harrogate or the like, the train journey there, a look around the shops, parks and museums, a meal in a nice restaurant, tea and scones at a tea house, the joy of staying in a hotel room at night, with breakfast laid on for you in the morning – how lovely it all was!

And if you did work for five days in a week then you were rewarded with the weekend. That lovely feeling of waking on a Saturday morning, refreshed after the extra sleep you were afforded and yet still, the whole day free ahead of you. You felt relaxed and peaceful but also happy like a child. The peace of Saturday mornings. That quietude of calmly drinking tea in your dressing gown, and slowly coming to life in your own time. And then to go shopping or what have you. And Sunday as well. Two whole days of utter freedom.

But the greatest thing of all were Fridays. True they were in some way the worst, since everyone was so exhausted and lacking in adrenaline by then that you struggled to get through the day. But that Friday feeling! Thank goodness it’s Friday! You could feel it in the air already on a Thursday evening. And as soon as you were up the next day, there it was again. A buzz and happiness pervaded the office, the streets, the shops, in fact the entire world. No, Friday was really the first day of the weekend. You chatted happily all day, joked and flirted with especial joy, and it was all so light-hearted and jovial. And then at 4.30pm you took yourself off, went for a round of drinks perhaps or some shopping, and when you got on the bus to go home you felt as if you were free, free, free! Free to be happy, free to do as you pleased, anything and everything seemed possible. Oh how good was that Friday feeling.

And now, now that she’d been unemployed for six months, that was the thing that most irked her. God, when Friday came she felt utterly, utterly dreadful. When you hadn’t done anything all week or all day, when your life was meaningless, empty and lonely, God that Friday feeling was a killer. You could sense it in the air, even if you were at home; but if you were out and about in town say, when the workers started to knock off at around four, then God it was terrible. It didn’t matter whether it was in Autumn with the nights cutting in, or in summer with the light nights and scantily clad girls, arm in arm, already heading out for a night out. It didn’t matter. You always felt it. Felt the guilt, for not doing anything, for wasting your life. And you felt totally out of tune with the world, as everybody, just everybody, seemed to be winding down, to be so light-hearted, to be basking in pure happiness. At such times Janet could only feel hatred toward the world, jealous of everyone and against it. She felt cut out and firmly in antagonism with all this good feeling. She was really in opposition to everyone at such moments, and she hated herself for it. She would have loved to have felt like them. What a wonderful feeling the Friday feeling is when you’re employed. But how utterly dreadful when you’re not!

So there it was and she saw it all very clearly. Work was the key. Courses and classes, charity shops and church, none of these things could in any way fill the gap left by it. They might be good things in their own right, things you could do in addition to work, but never were they a replacement. Work unfortunately was the thing.

She spent her days doing nothing. She would sit for hours in front of the TV. She watched the news and read the papers and got herself worked up by all the falseness of society. The news itself and the way in which it was covered hurt her. Even when a story was reported relatively sensitively, the very fact of everyone taking an interest in the sad fates of others, an interest in other people being killed, injured or abused, or simply ruining there own lives by committing crimes – none of this was right. Whatever feelings of sympathy news watchers might feel toward the tragic stories presented, there was always that underlying feeling that actually, they were really just taking gratification in the misery of others, in murders, deaths and violence. She hated the way the so called little people of society, nobodies like herself, found themselves caught up in the news and were reported as racists, psychopaths and paedophiles, and were dismissed, without right of reply, as though they were scum. Even in horrific cases, say for example if a mass-murderer was caught, someone who deserved to be treated like scum; even here it seemed wrong, to cover the story, show the photo of the murderer and denounce them as evil; for the whole thing was an absolute tragedy for the victims and it was as if the general public were titillating themselves on their misfortune; pretending to feel sympathy for them, but really devouring the entire story and lapping it up, thrilled and intrigued by the character of the mass murderer, and reliving in their mind’s eye all his deeds and getting off on all the gory details.

She always felt annoyed when photos of suspects were given: it provided readers and viewers with such a cheap kick. The whole media circus – those who worked in it, and those who watched it, the supply of it and the demand for it – was, if you sat back and thought about it completely base. It seemed to show that the human race was nothing more than little children in a playground, squabbling, gossiping and bullying each other; and the raging, soulless, selfish media beast proved that there was no God and that humanity had no leader. How was it that well-dressed, good looking, educated presenters could take a smug, ignorant and self-satisfied interest in other people’s affairs, in the death of innocent people, summarising stories and pigeon holing events, without ever knowing the full story and nosing about as if they had every right to in the misfortunes of others. And, so Janet imagined, old women, and uneducated morons sitting at home and saying ‘eeeh isn’t that shocking,’ and lapping it all up totally ignorant of how base it was. No matter what crime was reported, be it domestic abuse, a crime of passion or an abduction, viewers and presenters always pretended it was shocking and that they had no idea whatsoever about the motivation of a crime, even though anyone with half a brain could understand why these things happen; and – and this was the real cause for irritation – there was a silent and cynical subtext to the news which said as much. In other words if a rich young lady was killed, people said it was shocking and why on earth did such things happen, but it was evident from the choice of photo of the girl in question, that everyone knew the real motivation and understood the crime perfectly. Yet despite all this antagonism to the news, and despite appreciating that it was wrong, Janet was a news addict, watched it incessantly and got off on it, and was not only as bad, but in lots of ways worse than those news addicts who weren’t so wise as she.

And worse was the endless celebrity soup sludge. The obsession with good looks and plastic surgery. Despite herself she would watch documentaries on cosmetic surgery, showing you all the ins and outs of women having their breasts enlarged or the fat sucked out of their stomachs. And all this she watched despite herself, programmes she would have had the good sense to avoid if she had have been working. It crushed her soul and was depressing and nauseating, but she watched these shows with an avid interest all the same. And just as depressing, though in a different way, she watched documentaries about people with physical deformities, people without proper arms or legs, people with awful growths coming out of the front of their heads, little children who aged drastically, dwarves, co-joined twins, people with motor neuron disease, the list went on. It was so incredibly tragic and she felt profoundly dreadful. She felt so, so sorry for these people yet she just couldn’t get over the deformity and accept these people as human beings, though she knew she must. She would become obsessed by the deformity, was profoundly disgusted by it and couldn’t get it out of her head. She would try to pretend it didn’t bother her, that everything was normal and to recognise the person beneath, then when all that failed, she tried to imagine it happening to her, as it could well do, but again this failed to rouse any sympathy, although she was desperate to be sympathetic. She just couldn’t get over the deformities. It was simply too much to do so. She felt guilty, oh so guilty and depressed. What could you do for such people? In contrast to that she much preferred the thought of watching vein people indulge themselves with cosmetic surgery. For then she felt as though she were back on solid ground.

And then there was the internet. It was sterile, time wasting, unfulfilling. This she knew well, and previously she had derided those who used it and raved about it as sad, lonely, friendless losers, people who had nothing better to do with their time than absorb themselves in chatting and backbiting with a machine! And yet now she was one of them. She had at first believed there might actually be something to it, for example, it would be easier to meet people of a similar interest, she had thought. But that was not the case. Everyone, when they went on the internet, adopted a different personality to their real life one, and acted strangely and unnaturally: they were more aggressive, angry and narcissistic than in polite society. And who were these people, who could seriously prefer to ‘meet’ people and ‘talk’ to friends without the pleasure of their company, typing away ten to the dozen in order to carry on a simple conversation, having to make one statement at a time, before a reply came and they could make the next, instead of the easiness of interactive conversation; and deluding themselves about who they were and who they were talking to.

Internet dating had left her feeling very cold and lonely. She remembered what hope she’d held out for this initially. All those men. Surely there’d be one in this world with similar interests, someone who would understand her. Good news stories of lovers meeting and getting wed. But the reality was very different. Again, everyone deluded themselves about who they were. Everyone, when they wrote, was excited and perturbed and believed they were telling their tale to the entire world who were listening to their life story and were incredibly interested. You felt pleased when you had said your piece as though everyone now understood you. But it was just like a cry for help. Because if you read a couple of profiles, and saw the other side of the coin, you perceived how pathetic it all was, how easy it was to be delusional, and you realised how someone whining on about their life story was in no way attractive. If you sent an email and tried to get in touch, either the person, completely contrary to how they came across in their profile, came over as indifferent and uninterested, even though you met their requirements; or they hadn’t been on the internet for months and had lost all hope themselves along time ago. No, the mood people were in when they wrote their profile in abstraction was always in complete opposition to how they were in reality; and when people met someone who was exactly what they had asked for, it turned out, that that was not what they had wanted.

It was all so false. Everybody saying their little statement, backing it up sometimes with a photo, in which they gave a false look, trying to appear foxy or mysterious, or intelligent, wise and profound. God it was just like a cry for help! All those profiles, row after row of photos and statements all asking for this that and the other, demanding, egotistical, me, me, me, exactly like the long rows of dog kennels at the shelter, with dog after dog after dog barking out for love and affection! And why did internet dating seem to attract so many slimy men, men who called themselves kind, caring and sensitive and then asked for women who had to be young, intelligent and stunning, and who only spoke with those who had a photo. Intelligent, kind, caring were all bywords for attractive and when people talked of romance, love and happiness it was always with a beautiful partner in mind: and when they first met you that was what they wanted to know about you. It was all false.

Then there were a few souls who thought to be more honest, described themselves humbly, calling themselves plain or skinny or overweight, and sometimes attaching an unflattering photo. Yet when she looked at these photos and saw the humble statements, Janet felt utterly, utterly disinclined to meet these people. God it was just depressing. There attempt to be honest just back-fired. You had to meet people naturally and in the flesh, and fall in love that way. There appeared to be an inherent flaw in internet dating; and when you felt dislike for a person’s photo, and felt you could never like them based on that, you ended up thinking yourself shallow, even though in reality you weren’t. And when, in the real world, Janet saw men and women in love in spite of appearance, seemingly able to get along with each other and form a lasting relationship, and felt herself unable to do the same, she saw what it meant to be an internet dater.

Yet despite all this, she was obsessed by the internet and unhappily wasted her time on it. And when she’d been on for long hours at a stretch and was finally sick of it, she would go and look out of the window. She would feel terribly sick at heart to see the sun shining, the beautiful day outside, its simple purity rebuking and accusing her, and her whole life seeming to run away from her in meaningless sterility. And this was especially bad in Autumn, when the beautiful pure rays of afternoon, those bright-sombre rays of peace shone down and it signalled that shortly the day would be dark. And when the night started to cut in she felt utterly depressed at having wasted her day and at not having gone out.

In the summer she hated the sight of the young women, strolling about town, carefree and basking in the joy of youth. And there seemed to be hordes of them, all young, all incredibly beautiful. More and more she was out of humour with the world, would get irritable with people in public places, throwing a nasty look at a shop cashier who she imagined was disrespectful or scowling at school girls on a bus with their ultra short skirts and their swearing, arrogant behaviour and their precious little madam’s attitude, even though she had been like that when she was a school girl.

She still went for a cup of coffee and a sandwhich, but in truth, this was no longer a joy, but simply part of her pathetic routine. She had stopped going to a variety of cafés, but rather, she always went to her favourite one. And the worst thing was, was that the staff were beginning to recognise her. They always knew what she wanted for she always had the same thing. And she was always overdoing her pleases and thankyous and came across as excessively pleasant, partly because she felt guilty that they were working and she wasn’t, and partly because it was like a cry for help, her way of trying to interact with society. The staff seemed to know this and appeared to be growing sick of her. She would always go and sit down with her sandwich and coffee, and, believing that everyone was watching her, pick a newspaper out of her bag and pretend to be totally engrossed in reading it, so much so that she feigned to forget her food, and only ate intermittently.

One day after spending all day on the internet and feeling the day escape her, she decided she must just get out, at least if it was only to town. The sun was very much on the wane. The autumn darkness was slowly encroaching. She must make something of her day.

She went to town and to the café. They would be closing shortly, but there was just about enough time, wasn’t there? She rushed in, and being served by one of the young men who recognised her, took her sandwich and coffee. She sat down.

Two minutes later a young man and woman entered but were turned away: they were closed now.

The café had that end of the day feel to it. It was messy and one of the workers whom she recognised now walked around sweeping the floor and tidying up. He seemed really displeased by Janet’s presence, as if she was a nuisance. And sitting there by herself as she now was, she felt they wanted her out and that was exactly what she wanted to do anyway: she regretted having come at all; it wasn’t nice to feel rushed like this.

Then another man and woman entered. They were homeless people and often came here at the end of the day. The guy behind the counter gave them some free food and, as was often the case, allowed them to eat their food in the café.

Janet watched them. They were stereotypical waifs and strays, their clothing was ragged, they stank terribly and had greasy hair. The woman was especially old and dishevelled. And as Janet watched them as they excitedly tucked into their food, saw their sensitive and expectant eyes as they drank the first swig of hot coffee, saw how much this meant to them, how this was the only thing in their life they had, she saw herself in them, her own plight in theirs, and felt disgust at them. She, like them was dependent on others. The way the nice young man behind the counter had served them, these hopeless cases, just as he had served her, Janet, when he might have turned her away, and then informed that young, fashionable looking couple, that they were closed. All three of them were dependant on him, on his strength and kindness.

And the other young man? The angry one who went around sweeping? He was sick of them all. Sick of the homeless people and sick of Janet. The parallels were all too clear for her.

She made a hurried exit and walked along the street. It was one of those perfect November evenings, when it’s cold and dark, but there’s a certain calmness in the air, like a serenity, and the stars shone down from Heaven.

‘No, my life has reached utter rock-bottom’ Janet thought to herself, wrapping her scarf around her, her breath coming out visible in the cold air. ‘I cannot tolerate this anymore, and more to the point I won’t. I have pride, I have self-respect, I can’t go on like this, like a semi-homeless person, my only joy in life to go to a café for a bite to eat, dependant on the good will of others, and feeling oversensitive about it all. It’s got to stop. I’ve got to get my life back on track. And I know exactly what is missing in my life and how to make myself happy once more. No matter what it takes, no matter how hard it might be, I’m going to get another job and stick it out, and then finally, boring as it might be, I will be happy.