Day 119: September 27, 2009 (relative appreciation, speaking Japanese, and hitting dead ends)

Position: Driver

Number of Deliveries: 11

Sales: $385.88

Tips: $62

Hours: 3.42

Total Wage: $26.13 per hour

In the name of altruism (and because my girlfriend signed up), I ran in the San Diego 10k AIDS Run this morning, and hurt my right knee. Every time I skateboard or run, my knees become a little sore. This is different. Sharp pains shoot up my leg whenever I press the gas pedal, but the rich need their food, and I'm the Mother Teresa of Rancho Santa Fe. 

I'm driving around delivering, bummed about my knee and the fact I don't have insurance and can't see a doctor, wondering why I'm working this job, when I hear an interesting statistic on BBC's Business Daily: people surveyed in the U.S. would rather make $50,000 a year in an environment where their co-workers make $20,000 a year than make $100,000 a year in an environment where their co-workers make $200,000 a year. It seems we only measure success by our colleagues' income. Right now, I'm jealous of my former teaching colleagues, some of who are making decent money working full-time, and some who aren't, only because their jobs bring a certain level of social respect and fulfillment, whereas mine doesn't. Strangely enough, many of them are jealous of my situation and freedom, because they're bogged down in work and can't write.

A few weeks ago, there was a nice gold Cadillac in the parking lot, and on opposite sides of the back were two large, white bumper stickers with black lettering. One said, "If you can read this, thank a teacher." The other one said, "If you can read this in English, thank a veteran." I assume the reasoning behind the stickers is something my high school history teacher, Mr. Wilcox, used to say: "If the Japanese would have attacked the mainland immediately after Pearl Harbor, then they could have overrun the west coast, and we would all be speaking Japanese." Mr. Wilcox would place his hands together and bow after saying that. Or maybe the thinking is that if England fell to Germany, we would have gone next.

The impossibility of those logistics aside, the point is simple: the Cadillac man wants to feel appreciated for his service. We all do. But my current job carries with it neither the satisfaction of changing peoples' lives nor being appreciated, and it's starting to bother me.

I'm driving up the steep hill of Del Mar Mesa on delivery, illegally talking to my girlfriend on my cell phone, discussing my lack of health insurance and need to find a better job, when I become overwhelmed by anxiety. I'm lost. Or, better put, I don't know exactly where I'm going, and my "terminal degree" in creative writing isn't helping. I hang up the phone to concentrate on the map. I pull over, and put my face in my hands and let out a loud, primal scream. What the hell am I doing here? The futility of this job is getting to me. The work of feeding the rich is never done, though, and I must go on. I look at the map, figure out the roads to my delivery, and continue pushing up the hill.