The Slog: 40 Hours of Hell and 12 Days of Vacation Time

My Life in the Throes of Wage Labor

By Seanobi

This morning it was raining. Not normal rain, mind you, but the kind of heavy, frigid, rain that can only fall on a Monday morning. After surviving (narrowly) my short but precarious morning commute, I ran into what I thought was an odd stroke of luck on such a day, in such a downpour: a parking space close to the door. I had an umbrella, but in the last such storm it had literally blown apart in my hand, so finding a spot just a short jog away from the big glass security doors of the office on a day like today seemed like a good omen.

Then, I dropped my keys. Naturally, they fell underneath my car, and the only way to get to them would be to either drop to a prone position - which would of course result in drowning due to the several inches of water covering the asphalt - or to move my car. Foolishly, I chose the latter. Disengaging the parking brake, I began to push against the open driver's side door with one hand, the frame of the car with the other. In doing so, I slipped, slamming my left knee deep into the mud beside me, and kicking my right foot out into the worst place it could possibly go.

That's right, this Monday morning, lucky ol' Seanobi managed to run over his very own foot with his very own car. Now don't worry, folks, I'm fine. My foot is sore, and a chunk of metatarsal is likely drifting its way up a vein toward some narrow passage where it will kill me, but beyond that I'm a-okay. The big problem is that I had to explain the situation to my manager. Wearing a pair of jeans with a giant mudcake over the knee isn't the most comfortable way to spend a workday - especially a Monday - so I had to immediately hit the office gym and towel myself down after clocking in.

Now don't worry, folks, I'm fine. My foot is sore, and a chunk of metatarsal is likely drifting its way up a vein toward some narrow passage where it will kill me, but beyond that I'm a-okay.

Because this is a modern workplace, there is zero allowance for operating by one's own sense of good judgement. This means an email had to be sent not only to my manager, but to the two managers operating below him, as well, explaining my reason for not being at my desk at the strike of 9AM to answer emails and chat requests from people too lazy to read what, exactly, they were purchasing from our company before entering all of their most sensitive financial information onto the internet. Thus, I am now on record with my corporate employer - one of the largest businesses in its particular field, with operations in multiple locations in the United States as well as Canada and the UK - as the guy who ran over his own foot in the process of trying to recover his car keys.

Despite this, it's far from the greatest indignity suffered as a wage laboring customer service representative for a company (which will, for the sake of maintaining my tenuous employment status, remain unnamed) that specializes in offering services that the layman could easily perform on their own: document filing and preparation. That's right, we fill out forms. Plus, we'll submit those forms to agencies that file those forms, and then send those filed forms to our customers once we get those filed forms back. We're the ultimate middlemen, and, I must admit, one of the most truly capitalistic entities I know of: we have seen the market opportunity to capitalize on the laziness of American - and now Canadian and UK - citizens in situations where they would most benefit from acting on their own.

Thus, I am now on record with my corporate employer - one of the largest businesses in its particular field, with operations in multiple locations in the United States as well as Canada and the UK - as the guy who ran over his own foot in the process of trying to recover his car keys.

Why, exactly, would I subject myself to this manner of toil? Well, it's simple! There are a handful of reasons, but I'll share the most significant:

1: It's reliable income, with benefits

Though it may suck giant drippy floppin' donkey nuts, it is a steady paycheck. I get paid a few dollars more than I would earn waiting tables, and there are incentive bonuses for meeting my particular department, and particular team on that department, goals. I do this on the regular. You see, I'm no slouch. I'm a smart dude, and I kind of kick ass at my job, regardless of just how much I despise doing it.

There are also the benefits. For one, I get to avoid the hassles and labyrinthian requirements of Obamacare. I get admittedly sweet health care coverage. Medical, dental, mental health, even shot and long term disability coverage, along with an ample discount on prescription drugs. I might be happier as a barista, but I've done that before, and I've also needed serious medical care as one. It sucks. A lot. While I may not enjoy being a customer service representative, if my leg explodes or my lungs turn into non-dairy creamer, I'm covered.

Also, speaking of both creamer and coffee, there's plenty of it, free of charge (providing my co-workers exhibit the courtesy of making a new pot once they've finished the last). Throughout the day I'm irritated, but I'm also caffeinated.

2: Technology failed me

You'll probably need a little more elaboration on this one, and boy oh boy, am I happy to give it. You see, interestingly enough, this isn't my first stint with my current employer. I actually worked there before, in the exact same role, from Valentine's Day 2012 until late September of 2015. The year before that, this AMAZING new company called Lyft came to town. It was everything I could have ever wanted.

Well, not everything, but it was an opportunity to make good money on the weekends, on my own schedule, and it meant that I got to spend a lot of time with (mostly) cool people who were grateful for the service I provided. I began driving for Lyft on Christmas Eve of 2014, and from that day forward I loved it. I drove every weekend I could manage, usually anywhere between two to ten hours at a time, depending upon the incentives provided. Soon I expanded to driving for Uber as well. Then to Postmates. Then to Amazon Flex.

Within a few months, I was making steady income in my own car, on my own time, through my own phone. By September, I was making more driving for rideshare than I was at my day job. True, the benefits weren't there, but from what I could tell dedicating myself to full-time rideshare would more than make up for everything.

It didn't. All of September and most of October was fantastic for me, but after Halloween the incentives dried up. I was still making enough money to survive, but it wasn't the cash cow it has been for the months prior. I drove on the busiest days, at the most profitable times, but by the time it was well into winter people just weren't as interested in bar hopping.

Then, my car died. My poor, poor car. A 2006 Scion XB, it was the perfect vehicle for what I was doing. Aside from being my dream car from the moment I first learned of it in 2004, it was roomy, had perfect visibility, an amazing sound system, and it was the kind of unique ride that would be a topic of conversation in almost every ride shared.

My sweet, sweet BLT. RIP.

"Wow, this thing is way bigger on the inside than it looks on the outside!"
"Wow, there's so much room in here!"
"Wow, it's ugly as hell on the outside but I love it!"

All of these are true statements, and all of these are things I heard several times a week, and I was always glad to hear them. My BLT - that is, my Brave Little Toaster, as I had named it - was a fantastic vehicle. Unfortunately, it was also forced to endure over 30,000 miles within the span of one year. On one cold night in January, as I drove a pair of basic bitches to Dirty 6th, my temperature warning light illuminated. Dozens of miles from home in the middle of the night, I had no choice but to crawl it from downtown up to northwest Austin.

I pulled over every few minutes, stopping long enough for the engine to cool down. I poured water into the radiator, on the engine itself, anything I could think of to keep it cool long enough to make it home. Unfortunately, after reaching the highway driving segment of my journey, I couldn't push it any longer. The engine stalled at 55 miles per hour, and I was forced to pull it over.

Days of troubleshooting and thousands of dollars of what were revealed to be fruitless repairs later, I learned that the head gasket had blown. For those of you who are unfamiliar with auto maintenance issues, it was, as Mickey the Pikey is fond of saying:

This being my only form of employment at the time, I was able to obtain a new car within a week, and though it was too old for Lyft's requirements, Uber allowed my new (well not new, exactly) 2003 Honda Accord to serve as my trusty steed. I could still keep driving.

That is, until I learned...

3: Austin sucks

I first moved here in 2008. Before that, I had lived in Maine for 16 years. I hated it. Have you even been to Maine? It sucks! It's cold, it's barren, everything worth doing is 40 miles or more away from where you are at any given time, and it's only worth visiting for perhaps a week at a time during the summer sweet spot between late June and early August. That is, unless you're an elderly leaf peeper visiting in October, and if that's the case, fuck you, get off the road.

In those early days in Austin, things were great. I had always heard that it was a very libertarian town, and for all I could tell in my earliest experiences it fit that reputation. The cost of living was low, the people were laid back, and Austinites were more concerned with surviving other, excessively aggressive drivers to give a shit about what anyone else not a few car lengths away was doing with their lives.

Then, somehow, the worst parts of California decided that Austin was the destination of choice. They packed their bags to escape that state's collapse, but they made no effort to understand what, exactly had led to it in the first place. This meant that they were running away from authoritarian tax vampires while remaining carriers of that deadly virus when they arrived in my beloved Austin.

I'll make a long story short here: what was once a free and beautiful system of entrepreneurial minded individuals utilizing their own vehicles to offer low cost transportation options in a city with atrocious (naturally) public transit suddenly became the target of an existing cronyist taxi cartel - one with explicit ties to sitting city council members. Despite having received the largest campaign contribution on record from the city's established tax industry, council member Ann Kitchen's crusade to rid Austin of the scourge of affordable, and enriching rideshare services was a great success, and in May of this year Uber and Lyft both ceased rideshare operations in the city.

I, however, being a libertarian and more perceptive of the signs of encroaching statist overreach than most, knew that the end was nigh. I once again turned to my previous - and now current - employer. Remarkably, they accepted me back, despite my having left in the middle of my shift that prior September, pledging to never return. I had returned to my original pay rate, but I was again employed in the same role as before. It sucked, but it was steady work that was not imperiled by the city council's corruption. At least, not yet. Maybe one day.

I'll make a long story short here: what was once a free and beautiful system of entrepreneurial minded individuals utilizing their own vehicles to offer low cost transportation options in a city with atrocious (naturally) public transit suddenly became the target of an existing cronyist taxi cartel - one with explicit ties to sitting city council members.

So now, I am again a desk jockey. I respond to emails. I respond to chats. I remind people that the reason that they've just been charged a couple hundred dollars a month after their initial purchase is because they didn't bother to read that they were signing up for a thirty day trial. I am at the mercy of corporate apparatchiks who demand that forms be filled out when one manages to run over their own foot on a rainy day.

The question is, then, why? Why don't I explore other options? Well, for one, that's what I'm doing here! To clarify a bit, Uber isn't entirely gone. I still make solid money on the weekends as a driver for their food delivery service. Make no mistake, either: the money is damn good. They offer big incentives during their busiest hours, and last Sunday alone I was making $30 an hour just for picking up a meal and dropping it off at a customer's apartment. It isn't reliable enough to make a living out of, though.

Getting back to Steemit, though, I've always wanted to write. God damn, since I was a little kid I've dreamed of being able to sit at a desk and just put pen to paper (we didn't have laptops then, y'see) and dump the contents of my mind in the hope of earning enough money from it to pay for rent, bills, booze and weed. Okay, back then booze and weed weren't my goals, but that innocent young lad would one day turn into the man that is Seanobi.

PICTURED: Seanobi

I know that there have to be others out there like me, struggling to make it in a dead end position for a company that only exists due to the ignorance and lethargy of the voting populace. I know that you, too, are looking for a way out of the rat race, desperately seeking that one opportunity that is going to basically be a chain connected to a trap door that, once pulled, rains endless dollar bills directly into your bank account. My advice to you is this: stick with the day job, no matter how much it sucks. Save your money. Pay your bills. You'll get to a point eventually where your hard work will pay off, and that investment you've made in your own future will turn into the thing that funds whatever dreams you had once considered too outlandish to even dream.

Okay, back then booze and weed weren't my goals, but that innocent young lad would one day turn into the man that is Seanobi.

If you, too, are a wage laborer (I won't use the term slave, since I remain employed voluntarily, and the only existing modern slavery is taxation) then I encourage you to write about your experience here. Share your plight in the comments. Tell us all about where you are, where you've come from, and where you want to go. Personally, my goal is to get to a place where I am earning enough through passive income and writing to expatriate to some seaside town in Latin America - I'm lookin' at you, Valparaiso, Chile and Punta Del Este, Uruguay - and find some lovely local latina lover to make beautiful voluntaryist babies with.

How about you?