Once Upon A Time In My Life: Kittery, Summer of 2000
I move in with my Mom in to her tiny, two floor house off busy Government Street in the heart of Kittery in early summer 2000, following the loss of my job and apartment up in Portland. Most of my belongings (mainly books and furniture) are stored in Wells, located exactly midway between the two towns, but I keep some shorts, jeans, and assorted summer clothes out, and bring them with me. My room in Mom's house is maybe 12 feet by 10 feet, with enough space for a couch, tv, two tables, some plants, and her blowup air mattress that she's going to let me sleep on.
I need a job. Quickly. I need to get back on my feet, as I'm 34 years old and way too aged to be living in my mother's house for very long. When the alarm clock is hours off in one of the first mornings I spend at Mom's, a day I intend to look for a job, I know immediately, without a doubt, that the Kittery police have been at work in Mom's place, fucking with my clock so that it doesn't keep good time, and setting up cameras and mics throughout the house to monitor me. They have done this because I am such a bad guy, because of all the evil things I've done and because I am a waste of space, of oxygen. I don't blame them, much, but am still angry at the intrusion into Mom's life. Why should she have to suffer because the cops are out to get me? Their crap makes me angry, if only because they're fucking with a nice lady.
The first job I get is in a restaurant in North Hampton, NH, washing dishes part time. This minimum wage job is going to be a building block for me, a way to get my lazy ass back into the working life, into the 9 to 5 rush that so many take for granted. I want to do a good job at the restaurant. The head chef treats me with respect from the moment he meets me. He seems to be a nice man, and I like him right away. My first night is tough, though. I want to, and need to, be the best dishwasher any fucking person ever saw. I clean like a dynamo, trying to keep up with the endless stream of filthy, stinking dishes coming back to the kitchen from the packed dining room. There are one or two others cleaning with me. They, also, are decent sorts. One is an old timer who seems in over his head working at such a physical job, but I try to tell myself not to judge and just try to get along. The other cleaner is an attractive young woman, one who clearly should be serving food, not cleaning it up. I wonder in my mind why she, with her good looks and intelligence, would want to work in the kitchen and not make the much better pay that is available through a waitress position.
The dinner rush lasts about three hours, until closing time. Then, the staff in the kitchen work even harder to clean up the messes that have been left waiting, in order to get out of the place as early as possible. It is disgusting work but I try not to think too hard, to not put myself down for being there. The slop in a commercial kitchen left after a hard night's work is unbelievable. We make do the best we can, and I retreat to my Mom's house after I am let go for the night. I am tired and sore, but tell myself that this is just part time, just a start, just a way to get my foot in the door. I take a shower immediately upon returning to the house in Kittery and leave the messy and stinking work clothes in a pile near the washing machine in the basement. Do I really have to do this again?
My next shift is an evening or two later. I find out that the pretty girl's husband graduated from Harvard and wants to be a writer. At least I wasn't wrong about her having a brain. She interests me and intrigues me. Her husband, who works in the kitchen of a restaurant just down the road, must have spies because he begins to show up during slow times, seemingly to check me out.
I have begun to notice the cooks, who work in a somewhat separate area than the dishwashers. They are hard workers and intense, taking their jobs seriously. I interact little with them on this second night, but notice them paying close attention to me. I hear them discussing the Kittery police and the cameras that have been placed in our house. They think this is funny, and appropriate for a piece of shit like me. In my mind I have done nothing to them, but feel their hate and ridicule. The restaurant quickly becomes uncomfortable. That first shift becomes my most pleasant memory of the restaurant, since the cooks ridicule is all I think about, care about, from the second night on. Somehow, I manage to survive a couple of weeks of the abuse. But my patience is running short. In the beginning of a shift during my third or fourth week I bring two bags of garbage out to the dumpster behind the restaurant, seething with paranoia and hatred. One of the cooks that has been messing with me is alone, smoking a cigarette, just outside of the back door to the kitchen. I decide, what the hell, it's now or never. I'll challenge him to come clean. "You don't like me, do you? You don't want me working here, right?" He has no answer. He seems confused by my aggressiveness, by my passion. He can't fool me: I know he knows what I'm mad about. I yell "Fuck you!" and stamp off into the kitchen. This is my last night at the restaurant. I have had enough abuse, and won't be back.
I am right about the chef being a nice guy: A couple of weeks after I "quit", or really just stopped showing up, my last paycheck arrives in the mail.
My next job is as a janitor for a commercial cleaning company. My first assignment is cleaning at Liberty Mutual's Portsmouth, NH campus. The job starts at 5pm, just as the office workers are leaving for the day. Again, I simply want to do a good job, not thinking about being overqualified or how boring it will be. I'm trying to build a life and doing what I think I have to do to get by. The work is very simple, emptying small trash cans and vacuuming. I realize quickly that the work I'm expected to do in a four hour shift really only takes about an hour, maybe an hour an a half. But I can't help myself, and get everything cleaned as quickly as I can. But, just like at the restaurant, I start hearing people ripping me. This time it's the female supervisor, who tells the other workers that she will soon fire me because I am such a sleaze and lowlife. How can she be so open and nonchalant about her abuse, I wonder. Life is so disappointing, and people are so cruel. So I beat her to the punch: I say "I quit" in a fury after a week or so. She tells me, "You're not a man!" Why is she blaming me? She was going to fire me anyway.
A day or two later, I get a phone call from the manager of the cleaning company. She has another possible job for me. She tells me I'll work all by myself. Sounds good. The janitor job is at an Bauer warehouse in Greenland, NH. I arrive at this new assignment in the early afternoon. First thing to do is clean the office part of the building. There are secretaries and saleswomen here, mostly. And some offices, where all the men work. I clean the trash cans and, once the women leave, vacuum. Then I clean the bathrooms in the office section.
After the toilets comes the warehouse. There are two cafeterias to be mopped, and a filthy and wretched bathroom that turns my stomach when I scrub it clean. Just as in the dishwashing job, the first night I am so scared and concentrating so hard on doing a good job that I hear nothing.
Since I arrive for work during usual business hours, all the office and warehouse workers are still there. And I notice them noticing me quickly. From the second or third day, I know the female salespeople and secretaries are watching for my car when I pull into the parking lot. And there is one manager, a good looking guy with a dark head of hair and athletic build about my age, who becomes obsessed with me. He is watching me through whatever cameras have been placed throughout the building. He wants to figure out what makes me tick, and I resent it immensely.
The Bauer warehouse and offices have an alarm system that I am required to turn off during cleaning. I quickly learn that I am no match for the alarm, setting it off every night I am there. One of the nights, the police and this particular manager show up at the front entrance about 8 o'clock or so. The dude is nice to me, tries to keep me calm, but I know he is fucking with me.
The next night, I hear him from somewhere in the building. It is, again, about 7 or 8 o'clock and the building is otherwise empty. I realize that he, and a hooker he has hired for the night to witness the fun, have holed up somewhere in an office. And they are watching my every move on a laptop that is connected to the cameras. I can hear them laughing. I can hear them ridiculing me and my sorry ass attempt at a life. I have a brainstorm: I'll show this guy what a smart guy I am. The movie "Castaway" has just come out. I've seen it and liked it. In a conference room, I jot down on a notepad an idea for a Federal Express ad using the ending of the movie as a twist, to show my great sense of humor. I know the manager is able to read what I am writing and will think my idea great, that he would want to hire me for some type of marketing position with Bauer, I wait for him to make himself known. And wait.
Their talking stops once I begin to write down my idea. The two of them must be trying to be very quiet. They are not going to give me the satisfaction. They are going to let me down. He must really hate me. My shift ends in another disappointment, my hopes getting the best of me.
I can't go back to this job. Once again, I just don't ever show up again . This time, though, I never receive my last paycheck.
I need a job. Quickly. I need to get back on my feet, as I'm 34 years old and way too aged to be living in my mother's house for very long. When the alarm clock is hours off in one of the first mornings I spend at Mom's, a day I intend to look for a job, I know immediately, without a doubt, that the Kittery police have been at work in Mom's place, fucking with my clock so that it doesn't keep good time, and setting up cameras and mics throughout the house to monitor me. They have done this because I am such a bad guy, because of all the evil things I've done and because I am a waste of space, of oxygen. I don't blame them, much, but am still angry at the intrusion into Mom's life. Why should she have to suffer because the cops are out to get me? Their crap makes me angry, if only because they're fucking with a nice lady.
The first job I get is in a restaurant in North Hampton, NH, washing dishes part time. This minimum wage job is going to be a building block for me, a way to get my lazy ass back into the working life, into the 9 to 5 rush that so many take for granted. I want to do a good job at the restaurant. The head chef treats me with respect from the moment he meets me. He seems to be a nice man, and I like him right away. My first night is tough, though. I want to, and need to, be the best dishwasher any fucking person ever saw. I clean like a dynamo, trying to keep up with the endless stream of filthy, stinking dishes coming back to the kitchen from the packed dining room. There are one or two others cleaning with me. They, also, are decent sorts. One is an old timer who seems in over his head working at such a physical job, but I try to tell myself not to judge and just try to get along. The other cleaner is an attractive young woman, one who clearly should be serving food, not cleaning it up. I wonder in my mind why she, with her good looks and intelligence, would want to work in the kitchen and not make the much better pay that is available through a waitress position.
The dinner rush lasts about three hours, until closing time. Then, the staff in the kitchen work even harder to clean up the messes that have been left waiting, in order to get out of the place as early as possible. It is disgusting work but I try not to think too hard, to not put myself down for being there. The slop in a commercial kitchen left after a hard night's work is unbelievable. We make do the best we can, and I retreat to my Mom's house after I am let go for the night. I am tired and sore, but tell myself that this is just part time, just a start, just a way to get my foot in the door. I take a shower immediately upon returning to the house in Kittery and leave the messy and stinking work clothes in a pile near the washing machine in the basement. Do I really have to do this again?
My next shift is an evening or two later. I find out that the pretty girl's husband graduated from Harvard and wants to be a writer. At least I wasn't wrong about her having a brain. She interests me and intrigues me. Her husband, who works in the kitchen of a restaurant just down the road, must have spies because he begins to show up during slow times, seemingly to check me out.
I have begun to notice the cooks, who work in a somewhat separate area than the dishwashers. They are hard workers and intense, taking their jobs seriously. I interact little with them on this second night, but notice them paying close attention to me. I hear them discussing the Kittery police and the cameras that have been placed in our house. They think this is funny, and appropriate for a piece of shit like me. In my mind I have done nothing to them, but feel their hate and ridicule. The restaurant quickly becomes uncomfortable. That first shift becomes my most pleasant memory of the restaurant, since the cooks ridicule is all I think about, care about, from the second night on. Somehow, I manage to survive a couple of weeks of the abuse. But my patience is running short. In the beginning of a shift during my third or fourth week I bring two bags of garbage out to the dumpster behind the restaurant, seething with paranoia and hatred. One of the cooks that has been messing with me is alone, smoking a cigarette, just outside of the back door to the kitchen. I decide, what the hell, it's now or never. I'll challenge him to come clean. "You don't like me, do you? You don't want me working here, right?" He has no answer. He seems confused by my aggressiveness, by my passion. He can't fool me: I know he knows what I'm mad about. I yell "Fuck you!" and stamp off into the kitchen. This is my last night at the restaurant. I have had enough abuse, and won't be back.
I am right about the chef being a nice guy: A couple of weeks after I "quit", or really just stopped showing up, my last paycheck arrives in the mail.
My next job is as a janitor for a commercial cleaning company. My first assignment is cleaning at Liberty Mutual's Portsmouth, NH campus. The job starts at 5pm, just as the office workers are leaving for the day. Again, I simply want to do a good job, not thinking about being overqualified or how boring it will be. I'm trying to build a life and doing what I think I have to do to get by. The work is very simple, emptying small trash cans and vacuuming. I realize quickly that the work I'm expected to do in a four hour shift really only takes about an hour, maybe an hour an a half. But I can't help myself, and get everything cleaned as quickly as I can. But, just like at the restaurant, I start hearing people ripping me. This time it's the female supervisor, who tells the other workers that she will soon fire me because I am such a sleaze and lowlife. How can she be so open and nonchalant about her abuse, I wonder. Life is so disappointing, and people are so cruel. So I beat her to the punch: I say "I quit" in a fury after a week or so. She tells me, "You're not a man!" Why is she blaming me? She was going to fire me anyway.
A day or two later, I get a phone call from the manager of the cleaning company. She has another possible job for me. She tells me I'll work all by myself. Sounds good. The janitor job is at an Bauer warehouse in Greenland, NH. I arrive at this new assignment in the early afternoon. First thing to do is clean the office part of the building. There are secretaries and saleswomen here, mostly. And some offices, where all the men work. I clean the trash cans and, once the women leave, vacuum. Then I clean the bathrooms in the office section.
After the toilets comes the warehouse. There are two cafeterias to be mopped, and a filthy and wretched bathroom that turns my stomach when I scrub it clean. Just as in the dishwashing job, the first night I am so scared and concentrating so hard on doing a good job that I hear nothing.
Since I arrive for work during usual business hours, all the office and warehouse workers are still there. And I notice them noticing me quickly. From the second or third day, I know the female salespeople and secretaries are watching for my car when I pull into the parking lot. And there is one manager, a good looking guy with a dark head of hair and athletic build about my age, who becomes obsessed with me. He is watching me through whatever cameras have been placed throughout the building. He wants to figure out what makes me tick, and I resent it immensely.
The Bauer warehouse and offices have an alarm system that I am required to turn off during cleaning. I quickly learn that I am no match for the alarm, setting it off every night I am there. One of the nights, the police and this particular manager show up at the front entrance about 8 o'clock or so. The dude is nice to me, tries to keep me calm, but I know he is fucking with me.
The next night, I hear him from somewhere in the building. It is, again, about 7 or 8 o'clock and the building is otherwise empty. I realize that he, and a hooker he has hired for the night to witness the fun, have holed up somewhere in an office. And they are watching my every move on a laptop that is connected to the cameras. I can hear them laughing. I can hear them ridiculing me and my sorry ass attempt at a life. I have a brainstorm: I'll show this guy what a smart guy I am. The movie "Castaway" has just come out. I've seen it and liked it. In a conference room, I jot down on a notepad an idea for a Federal Express ad using the ending of the movie as a twist, to show my great sense of humor. I know the manager is able to read what I am writing and will think my idea great, that he would want to hire me for some type of marketing position with Bauer, I wait for him to make himself known. And wait.
Their talking stops once I begin to write down my idea. The two of them must be trying to be very quiet. They are not going to give me the satisfaction. They are going to let me down. He must really hate me. My shift ends in another disappointment, my hopes getting the best of me.
I can't go back to this job. Once again, I just don't ever show up again . This time, though, I never receive my last paycheck.
posted by joe sweeney at 3:30 PM
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