40 years into the future

This morning I went to a birthday/retirement party for a friend who’s worked for 40 years at the library system. Forty years! I think this was his first real job after graduating from college. I’ve been trying to imagine what life would have been like if I’d stayed at some of those early jobs I worked. What a journey!

After a semester of grad school at the University of Maryland, I decided a Master’s degree in creative writing really wasn’t the best route to go, so I came back to Oklahoma to consider my options (and be near my boyfriend). I got a job as a typesetter and sometime reporter for a local newspaper, making just barely over minimum wage. I moved into a dive of an apartment was thrilled by my independence. Over time, the editor let me write some mildly entertaining stories and take some photographs of grand openings and candid photos of kids playing in the park. I came up with a summer series, creating a Fun-O-Meter and rating different activities on a scale of 1-10. Totally cheesy! Would I have been able to spend 40 years at that job? Not without ending up as the co-editor in the corner office, a shriveled up woman with a dowager hump, who muttered to herself and obsessively collected designer Barbie dolls.

Next it was on to a desktop publishing job, putting together specialized directories. I learned how to do this on one of the early Macs, and got to be a whiz at Pagemaker. My boss was a chain-smoking, coffee-drinking sexual harasser, but in the days before Anita Hill, no one had the nerve to call it such. He was always wanting to pop my back. He’d bring me into his office to play mind games. My supervisor was his live-in girlfriend, so there was really no one I could talk to about my discomfort. Lasting 40 years in this job was not an option as the owner went bankrupt and my boss was investigated for misappropriation of funds. I was never more thrilled than the day I was let go. Sweet release!

On to another stint as a desktop publisher, this time sharing office space with a certified psychic. The days would drag out as my boss only had enough work coming in to keep me busy for half the day. The rest of the time I would read, balance my checkbook, or eavesdrop on the pyschic's sessions. She had a pretty good client base. Often, I'd hear her talk about a future journey, or a big change just around the corner, or perhaps the need to evaluate a certain relationship -- stuff that was so general as to apply to anyone's situation. Staying there wasn't an option: not enough to keep me busy. But I definitely could see myself, after 40 years, becoming Madame AQ: the Typesetting Psychic.

"Hear your future, and, while you wait, let me make you up a nifty set of business cards!"