Downsized.

• Author: Gilbert, Bernard
• Position: Job seeker narrative - Journal Entry - Cover Story - Column

The day after I got laid off, Bill Clinton came by my house and hugged me. We both cried. Outside in the street, hard-bitten Secret Service agents eyed the hookers on the corner.

Drying my eyes, I told him I was in favor of universal health care on the Canadian model. He thanked me and assured me he'd heard me. He said if there was one thing he'd do as President, it would be to listen to the American people.

After Bill left, I started looking through the job ads in the Sunday paper. I found lots of openings in sales, on commission. I felt as if the oxygen had been sucked out of the room. In the hip weeklies, lots of ads saying: Activists! Now's the time to change the world, which means calling strangers on the phone and asking them for money, or standing on their doorstep and asking for money. Also some wellpaid work in the sex trades, for young women.

I went to a career-counseling interview: "This will help you," said Kathy, my counselor, handing me a flier headed SUPPORT GROUP FOR WOMEN. She advised me to join Toastmasters and leave the state. "You have a lot of potential," she said. "We could do anything with you. I wish there were more time to work with you." Then she ushered me out of her office, thirty minutes before the scheduled end of our appointment.

I spent several days sitting in my room, reviewing my options. Every once in a while, one or another of my roommates would knock on the door. "What are you doing in there?" they'd ask. "I'm polishing my resume," I'd say.

I signed up for a class in indexing. The brochure said there was lots of work out there. What is indexing? I'm not sure. Also signed up for a workshop in technical writing. Brochure said the same thing. What is technical writing? Who the hell knows?

I thought about an unpaid internship as a way of getting some skills under my belt. Three places turned me down because my resume isn't good enough.

I took a walk to clear my head. Everywhere I go in the city, I see huge slogans spray-painted on walls: MOVE HEAVEN AND EARTH TO DEFEND THE LIFE OF CHAIRMAN GONZALO. That one's always seemed especially relevant to my life.

A company offered me occasional editing work, a day here, a day there. To get the job, I had to pass three tests: a proofreading test, a twelve-minute personnel test, and the all-important urine test. Can't have some drunk pushing the blue pencil.

I saw a story in the paper that California has the highest unemployment rate in the nation. It was right next to...