Labor Day

PSoTD tagged me to answer the question: What does Labor Day really mean to you?

It’s never really meant much of anything to me, besides a day off, but this year, it just reminds me that I still remain unemployed after getting laid off last year. It reminds me of the nine gazillion résumés I’ve sent out to no avail. It reminds me that my unemployment has run out. It reminds me how terribly broke and teetering on the brink we are, and how guilty and embarrassed I feel about my inability to get a new job. Not that I need to be reminded of any of these things, as they prey on my mind every day.

It’s a terrible feeling, the despair at being unproductive, coupled with the frustration of not being able to find employment and hence regain some control, some sense of pride and achievement. I mitigate the loss of workplace accomplishment with blogging; it helps me feel less useless, like I am contributing something, at least. But my labor has no market value, and so I still struggle, at times, not to feel worthless, even though my labor is.

I’ve never been the type to define myself by my job. I’ve worked since I was 15, and I was never reluctant to put in long hours, late nights ,weekends, whatever it took to get the job done well, but I never felt like my self-worth was predicated on my position or my salary. I didn’t feel better about myself with promotions or raises, and when I took a cut in pay for a more low-key job after a stint at a particularly nightmarish firm, I didn’t feel any different about myself, just a lot less stressed. But I never considered—never had to, until now—that even though what I earned didn’t matter, just the simple fact of earning something did. A recognition that my contribution, my labor, mattered. It was, literally, worth something.

Without the acknowledgement a paycheck provides, I feel rootless and disconnected from where I’m supposed to be, as if I’m in exile from the rest of the world, where people have a place and a purpose. And then there are the practical considerations of having no income—our life is tearing apart, and I feel helpless and desperate and it’s all my fault. Or so it feels, in spite of my best efforts.

I certainly don’t mean for this to sound, if it does, like my circumstances are unique or special. It is, in fact, because I know they're not that I'm willing to talk about this so plainly, though it's not especially easy. One of the worst things about being unwillingly unemployed for so long is that, after awhile, people stop asking how you're doing, how the job hunt is going. It's shameful, whether it should be or not, and it gets harder to speak about the longer it goes on. And, in a splendid little ironic twist, harder to get a job again, too, as that gap on the C.V. ever widens. Then one day you find yourself asked to speak about Labor Day, and it's tough to think of anything else but how you miss the grind of work that makes you gasp for it like a desert oasis.

So, being a purveyor of worthless labor, and an optimist, I guess I’ll just look at this Labor Day as an extra day to spend with Mr. Shakes. No matter what else is happening around us, that is always a good thing.