Ignoble

"All women nest. Women are nesters."
"What's a nester?" one of the guys answers.
The large buck says in his effeminate helium, "you know, they start collecting things- objects to make a home. Start acting all crazy and becoming pack rats. You know what I do in my house? I find her crap and I set it by the trash can. I let it sit there for 2 weeks, and then you know what I do?"
"You throw it away!" the young guns say in unison.

Not so much that they agree with Papa Bore, not so much that they DON'T know what nesting is- more because this is how every conversation goes when the Silver back emerges from his office (which we dread) to come out and make sure all the lesser creatures are on task and we are. We definitely are, because this shit has gotten so fucking old.

1. Arrive at your job.
2. Assess the situation based off of activity, facial expressions, and current works in progress.
3. Do your job.
4. See your boss if you haven't already, and decide how far you want to push it or how much you are willing to take today.
5. Do your job.
6. Look at the clock.
7. Repeat 5 and 6 only breaking in the cycle to fight wars in your head against an impenetrable wall of Southern Californian ego, or to harass co workers to pass the time in an effort to avoid showing how we really feel about our pathetic fucking existence in this Boutique basement.

This building was a bank in a previous life. Millions of dollars worth of the people's assets sat in this very room. The dollars and jewelry, war bonds and repossessions probably lined the concrete walls of this Oil town's first big time bank. This isn't the "vault" though. The vault is what you see when you are checking in. It covers the entire wall behind the front desk.

The irony is... There is no irony. There is only the Will of the world around you proving over and over again, that YOU just don't get it. Won't ever get it, but if you're lucky, you might get at least a chuckle out of missing the bus when you were standing there on time waiting... Likely if you crack a smile at all, it's because the driver made eye contact as they passed your ass up, and now you have something on someone else.

"At the daily meeting, they said employees can't have visible tattoos," says The Bore as he hones in on my thoughts...
"Fire me." I say.

This is how to start a conversation where I work, where I make $10 an hour, in the basement of this Dillinger era bank-turned-boutique hotel.

I have worked here for a year now, and apparently it's corporate review time even though it doesn't mean a fuck because there is a raise freeze. And yes. Getting a raise is all that matters to me when it comes to getting "reviewed", because I know what I am worth and what I have given to this place and I know what this place has fucking done for me.

During my first couple of months here, I had to wear a scarf around my neck, roll my chef jacket sleeves all the way down, and wrap my wrists in ace bandages. It was 90 degrees. I was condescended to every day because they didn't know me. Eventually, even though the dress code in the place is very strict, people looked the other way. A noble way to treat one of 10 human beings who work in a basement with no windows for shit pay and a joke of an insurance plan in the deepest of Conservative south... Ignoble.

Now, I don't cover anything really. What I hated about being mummified wasn't that I was being asked to hide the apparently challenging testament to things I am willing to do to my own body... I had just come from a somewhat different career where, fabric carried germs and blood. Being wrapped from head to toe (looking like I had tried to kill myself or was a burn victim because of the bandages) while preparing delicate and intricate meals for people felt unclean and sad. The dinner guests became Germans eating the spoils of its decimated neighbors. The clinks of the wine drowning out the fires in the sky with the filth of shameful neglect and greed changing the face of every molecule they stepped over with averted eyes...

My sleeves would drag through every bit of food I encountered during prep and service and break down. Somehow looking like a sloppy, knuckle-scraping cutter was preferable to corporate. How ironic...

I meant to steel this note from the employee bulletin from Corporate today. It's another one of their Security Alerts. I like the Security Alerts because they are like my Sunday funnies. This particular alert wanted to let all "Associates" know that they will be targeted because this is the time of year that the Rodeo and The Ringling Bros. Circus is in town. To paraphrase, the posting said that cars can be broken into for valuables. Thieves tend to like Ford F-250's. Make sure to lock your possessions up "Because of the nature of the Attendees in these Industries." Another place to see the word "Associate" is on the remedial coffee urn that serves shit coffee not intended for guests.



So, to be clear here... Cowboys and Clowns are not to be trusted.

I went to the Ringling Bros museum in Florida years ago. Interesting place. It was the home to many paintings that Ringling had amassed during a surely interesting lifetime. There was a huge big top miniature exhibit and some other historical anthropology. The kitchen was tiny, tiled, beautiful and tall. The veranda was right out of Scarface. I missed most of the collection, as I pushed my tired two year-old through the halls while the Silver backs held back and made echoing jokes about the genitalia of the sculptures and paintings, including a Bronze cast of Michelangelo's David.

Papa Roach grabs me when I hear him say across the room to my monkey brothers, "I thought it was hard when he would just lay there and I had to feed him.. My day off was wasted. Wait until they are almost a year old, dude. It was so much easier before he could crawl and get around. I come to work to get away... You guys think I am kidding, but I am not."

We know he isn't kidding. he puts earplugs in his ears when his baby is crying all night with a fever.

"Wait until they suspect you are a hypocritical liar, and they tell you that you have ruined their life and broken their heart.. at four years old.. followed immediately by a 5 minute argument that you lose about getting another apple even though they just poke holes in it and leave it under the bed, " I say.

I miss so much because I am nesting I guess.

I have never been to a Rodeo, but ironically, this isn't my first.

Part of getting reviewed is reviewing the Silver Back. Most people don't.