My new boss, the same guy who says he fears
ending up in a poem someday, as if
that could ever happen, sits waiting
earnestly for my reply to his question,
but his query does not compute,
so I squirm in my seat and sweat.
I reconsider the question,
“What can we do to make you love
your job?” An extended paid leave
keeps bolting from my brain,
but I grind my teeth shut,
not wanting the truth to escape
because there’s the mortgage,
car payments, and my extravagant
lifestyle that being a librarian
at a community college affords me,
so I nix going all in with honesty
and remain stumped. I mean ever since I signed
my first deal with Mammon one summer
to bale hay for a crazed dairy farmer
and moved on to engagements as garbageman,
turd herder, weed wacker, mailroom geek,
parking lot attendant, telephone operator,
freshman comp teaching fellow, newspaper
delivery man, microfiche filer and then finally
falling into this gig as a librarian, I have never
asked for more than a decent wage and a sane boss
from any job, while my wife, our kids, our friends,
my family, faith, and art have provided me
with more meaning, joy, and love than any man
has a right to expect,
but my boss is still waiting
on an answer. I decide to aim low and ask
to be taken off nights. He shakes his head slowly,
breaks eye contact and begins to explain
that because of budget cuts and hiring restrictions,
I will remain as enamored of my job as ever.
From Alan Berecka’s A Living is not a Life: A Working Title; Order at Amazon