When you grow up reading stories about fairy-tale princesses,
you never imagine yourself having to tar the roof of someone else's castle.
I hate working. So much so that I find having to work almost insulting. I have
scraped and sanded my fingerprints down to the point where the tumbler in the
barrel of a safe felt as if it had its own heartbeat. To this day, I can feel
a single strand of my hair through four sheets of paper simply by running my
hand over the soft, smooth, flat, yellow surface of a legal pad. Manual labor
is what I seem to be good at, and let me tell you, the nobility of the working
class is highly overrated. It's not like sitting in an air-conditioned office,
e-mailing your co-workers about who got the drunkest at T.G.I. Fridays' last
Happy Hour.
I would like nothing better than to walk into my backyard and pluck a couple
dollars off the fig tree every morning before walking down to the corner for
a leisurely cup of coffee. Maybe I'd pick a fifty or a hundred for the schizophrenic
who sleeps in the parking lot of the ludicrously expensive market around the
corner-- the one I can't stay out of because they have excellent deli-cuts and
a free olive bar.
I went for almost an entire year without cooking a single meal in my kitchen--
an act of retaliation against having no one but myself to cook for. I admit
it may also have had something to do with the fact that I also hate doing any
sort of housework, such as doing the dishes. I own two bowls. The other night
I caught my boyfriend trying to eat cereal out of a flower pot.
In any case, had it not been for Zupan's, the aforementioned overpriced super-bistro,
I would have starved to death last summer. They put out free samples out at
lunchtime, Zupan's does-- they lure you in with beet salad and you wind up walking
out with a four-dollar apple. It seems fair.
After eating about fifteen dollars worth of free chocolate in there the other
day, I went to a complimentary wine tasting at the grocery outlet. There was
an 80-year-old man playing the mandolin, and free cheese and crackers. "You
have ten minutes," said the sommelier, "Drink up."
Work is for the motivated, and, having the work ethic of Little Lord Fauntleroy,
I don't enjoy showing up at a job site under a still-full moon so I can spend
the next ten hours wearing a respirator, sanding Bondo. Call me a shy and delicate
desert flower; but it's hard for an insomniac such as myself to get any rest
when I'm expected to clock in at 5:45 a.m.
I quit the Bondo-sanding job. In fact, I have quit almost every job I've ever
had. As long as you keep your standards sufficiently low, it's not that hard
to find another one.
Once, for between 5 and a hundred years, I even tried to marry a rich husband.
(Lord knows, I tried.) But being unemployed made me feel lazy and pathetic.
Even so, ever since I've been divorced, I've been keeping my eyes peeled for
a guy wearing a toupee driving a Bentley. I even saw one in Paris, but instead
of chasing him down the street like I should have done, I spent the crucial
moment wondering whether or not there was a specific French word for "mid-life
crisis." Needless to say, by the time I'd settled the matter, the moment
had passed.
I was born and raised in America. I know what I was bred to believe in: the
promise of getting rich quick; the notion that frantically scratching on lottery
tickets with a worn dime will somehow hurl you onto the deck of a yacht, where
you will immediately be served a mimosa (and, if you're lucky, lots else besides)
by your cabin boy. Me, I just as soon scrub the planks-- if I'm going to gamble
I want some action-- ponies, roulette, three-card Monte.
It's an odd dichotomy to be a cheapskate who squanders paychecks on the excesses
of entertainment. I might not own a frying pan or an alarm clock, but I'll drop
a month's wages in a casino without batting an eye. I have spent entire days
digging for buried treasure in the backyard in an effort to avoid having to
find another job. I've spent hours dreaming up ridiculous entrepreneurial ideas
such as the Topless Shoe Shine Parlour, an idea that would go over like hot
cakes and sweep a nation of C.E.O.'s in dirty shoes.
Inventions? Oh, believe me, I have some great ideas. I have yet to realize
any of these inventions, but when I do, no home will be without a rechargeable,
vibrating, electric broom that flies.
There are mornings when I would like nothing more than to pace around the house
all day, play with the cats, masturbate and, maybe, go to the bank-- if I'm
feeling industrious. Write, if I am feeling plucky. These are the days I open
my eyes and grumble the word, "Fuck" before saying "Good morning"
to the cats-- the cats who could also sleep all day, one snuggled under each
of my armpits. The cats who don't have to get out of bed.
I work as little as possible. Its one of the many joys of self-employment.
I know exactly how much money I need to keep myself knee-deep in beer and okra.
And, in exchange for health insurance, sick pay, maternity leave, retirement
benefits, two weeks paid vacation, a 401k plan, all those things associated
with "real work," I'll take the freedom of being self-employed.
Alena Nahabedian is a Senior Contributing
Editor to Lime Tea. Thinks she's been phoning it in the last few issues?
So do we.
