An Honest Job Application
Hitting send as we speak
I work two jobs at the moment: part time admin and tutoring. I’m aiming for a third.
Why, you ask?
Because I want to do more than just barely survive. I want to do more than drag my feet from paycheck to paycheck only to one day cark it on the way to the grocery store for toilet paper and butter.
After a year on Medium, I realize writing will never really help me achieve this small scale economy class dream. The writing life is high in dopamine but low in dollars and cents.
I initially thought writing would nicely supplement my other income. But the amount of energy you put into it is hugely disproportionate to the amount of money that comes back out of it.
For the first 40 years of my life I felt I was destined to win a Nobel Prize or a Pulitzer. At the very least, a Booker Award. I have now thoroughly woke the fuck up. The scales have fallen from my eyes and I am grumpy and hungover with a vengeance.
As the saying goes, I want to go places.
For example, I’d like to travel around the world. Even if it’s in the back row of Economy Cattle Class nearest the toilet. Just get me back up in the air before the world explodes.
For my third potential job, I’m looking at a part time customer service role in the dodgy insurance sector.
Because selling insurance to worried people is far more lucrative than writing poetry and satire.
There are a number of questions on their application form I have already answered plainly wrong. You see, I am entering a new subversively honest stage in my life. Much like the writing life, this is big in catharsis but miniscule in results. I’m choosing catharsis.
Put differently, I have fucking had it up to here with life.
Here are the questions along with my answers below on the insurance company’s application form:
- Are you a positive person with a can-do attitude? No. Are you? Were you born yesterday or are you simply trying to make me fucking laugh?
- Do you have a calm demeanor when you are faced with aggressive customers? Yes, yes I do. Very calm, like the Godfather. Like Vito Corleone right before a planned vendetta.
- Are you a fun, outgoing team player who is always looking to go above and beyond? Above and beyond what? A cliff? The laws of gravity still apply to even such as a superstar as myself. Sorry to disappoint.
- Are you a fast learner and ready to hit the ground running with complex jargon, irrational rules, and archaic computer systems? No, no I’m not. Not even close. I’m a slow learner, ask a lot of dumb questions, and get bored easily. If you introduce too many foreign concepts I will start writing poetry.
- Can you turn a bad call with an angry customer into a hard sale of an insurance package with higher premiums? Not really. I sometimes find I accidentally hit the ‘disconnect’ button when a customer starts raising their voice in my ear.
- Can you sell extras such as foot massages and primal therapy that people simply don’t need and will never use to hard up skeptics? I tend to do the opposite, naturally agreeing and sympathizing with their skepticism. These turn out to be my best calls, where we are both on the same page, laughing out loud, and parting ways with absolutely no sale.
- Can you work overtime and weekends and have your ringer on all hours of the day including your days off in case we need you at the drop of a hat? God no. I’m not an emergency service. Are you selling more than just insurance?
Clearly this company is looking to hire a wooden doll or a sociopath who lies on every question of their application. I just told them the truth and they tossed my application in the recycle bin.
Italy will have to wait.
© Carlo Zeno 2023
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Thank you the The Haven. For more dysfunction and untimely honesty, try these two below 👇
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