Cover Letters (Tribute: Joey Comeau)

Notes from the Road: Currently in Oklahoma to witness my dear friends S's wedding (the Forbidden Union). Though the hotel is a lot nicer than we all expected for the price, this isn't ideal conditions for blog post composition. Yet, I'm with old friends and, after ten hours on the road, I'm still glad to see them every moment.

And then there's other things. Truth be told, I haven't been able to give SDR as much attention as I would have liked these past few months. I've been reusing material that I wrote months or years ago for exactly situations such as these. I'm very glad to share these pieces with you, but it's not necessarily by choice.

Since June, I've traveled from Louisiana to Minneapolis, four times back and forth between Iowa City and Minneapolis, and now from Minneapolis back and forth to Oklahoma. I've applied for more jobs than I care to share. Before I left New Orleans, I told AC that the job search was already weighing heavy on me and, in an uncharacteristic demonstration of disgust, he said, "Yeah, I know. Job searching is just so physically, mentally, emotionally exhausting..." It's that last point that resonates with me, and it took a few weeks for me to decide why.

Job searching, writing cover letters in particular, is a process of sharing with strangers your personal and professional triumphs and aspirations and then being told, more often than not, that "It's not a good fit," or, that they've found "a better qualified candidate." It's a horrifying, humiliating, scarring process if you stop to think about it.

IB told me that after writing so many cover letters she got to the point where she wasn't really writing cover letters anymore. They had devolved into weird, personal missives. One, which told the brief story of her odyssey to become a community organizer, landed her a job. After meeting her coworkers, I understand why this was attractive to them -- they are an emotionally involved lot, but nonprofit folk tend to be.

This all reminded me of a project and book by Joey Comeau, poet and author of A Softer World, called Overqualified. It's a series of fake cover letters he wrote channeling some of the more absurd points of job searching. You can read some of the letters here -- or buy the book and support indie authors.

Anyway, a tribute. This in response to my favorite job posting for a position I Really didn't want:

Dear Sir or Madam:

I am very glad to apply for the Private Investigator position with Walker and Ritter Investigators. With my qualifications, vastly superior to all the other candidates, I would make a terrific contribution to the company. What are those excellent credentials, you may ask? Well, being professional investigators, I leave that for you to discover (good luck). If you haven't been able to find substantial evidence supporting my claim in one month's time, then I guess we'll just have to both consider my craft and acumen proven. In the meantime, I have most of a page left, and I'd like to tell you a story.

There is a small bar/cafe in the Lichtenberg borough of Berlin that I visited with my classmates and friends. It was a cold day in January and we had just finished a long day of touring museums, including the infamous Hohenschoenhausen prison, the Stasi headquarters. It was a beautiful cafe. We sat crowded around a small, rectangular table drinking scotch and beer and talking idly about the city. I was taking notes, St. looked at me strangely and said, "Sam, stop writing." I asked him why, and he replied, "Because we just went to the Stasi museum. I'm German. Writing makes me nervous."

Indeed, the prison made us all nervous, especially the final stretch of the tour. All twenty of us Americans and two Germans stood huddled in a small, concrete, frigid enclosure with two impregnable metal doors on either side of us, wire mesh above, while the tour guide spoke.

I'll paraphrase: "There's a joke: Bush, Gorgachev, and Honecker are being chased by cannibals. Bush turns around and shouts, 'Spare me and I'll take you to a capitalist paradise.' And the cannibals eat him. Gorbachev turns around and shouts, 'Spare me and I'll take you to a worker's paradise!' And the cannibals eat him. Honecker keeps running and shouts over his shoulder, 'Keep following me and you'll be in East Germany in ten meters.' He looks back and the cannibals are gone."

We all laughed, and then the guide said, "It's funny, isn't it? But that joke was told by a twenty year-old man to his friends at a gathering after church. He was arrested and taken here." The guide gestured around him. "This is where prisoners in the later years were allowed to stand outside for fresh air. It was the only time any prisoner was allowed to be outside. You couldn't see the city or hear it -- you didn't even know you were in the city. But, at night you could see the stars in this tiny, concrete enclosure. And if you could see the sky, there was hope."

Chilling and uplifting, didn't you think? We come from very different backgrounds, Valerie Ritter, but I'm sure that you and I had a moment of empathy when you went on the same tour two weeks ago on vacation. The "rest chambers" are really unnerving, I found. But, I'm sure that you also felt some twinge of professional respect, just as I did.

You're probably wondering  how I knew that you were at the Stasi prison two weeks ago. Furiously wondering. Probably wondering how I know you didn't have anything but an Americano from Cafe Envie for breakfast because you hit the snooze too many times, very uncharacteristic. You order Caesar Salad with Ranch dressing on the side. You're left handed, but try to pretend to be ambidextrous. Last month you memorized the Salic Law speech from Henry V just to see if you could. You're obsessed with puzzles and logic games. Every evening you play Go, Chess, or Scrabble against opponents all over the world and typically win. Sometimes it's just Sudoku.

For the reasons stated above, and those credentials I'm sure you will never find, I believe I would make an exceptional member of your team. I very much look forward to hearing back from you and wish you all the best in discovering my contact information.

Best,

SF

Tribute to Chuck Palahniuk

To Chuck Palahniuk:

And IB muttered, "This city..."

"I came back for the soil," DB said. She returned shortly after the flood waters that followed Hurricane Katrina finally receded. Most of St. Bernard Parish has been a sugar plantations for centuries up until very recently. It's rich, sweet soil for gardening.

"It's home," said OH. "There's a lot of history in this area. New Orleans is the fulcrum of the country... The city has to be here."

"You'll meet the nicest people you'll ever know in this city," JH said. "Everywhere you go, there'll be someone with food."

"My cousin was by the levee in the woods when it happened," DB said. "He said he heard a sound like a bomb going off and then everything went quiet. And then he saw deer, squirrels, birds, all these animals, every animal in the forest started running past him. The entire forest was in a stampede to get out of there."

VG: "The first time the fire department realized something was wrong, a friend of mine was in the room with the New Orleans chief. He got a call from some guys who said, -- There are all these fires on the north shore. -- Well, why aren't you putting them out? -- We can't get to them. -- Why can't you get to them? -- Because of all the water in the streets. And then the chief yelled, 'Fuck! The levees broke! It's the only explanation...'"

"You know, I wouldn't be surprised if they blew up the levees for Betsy," said LD. "But for Katrina the whole city was destroyed. Nobody got anything out of that."

"I have a friend in the National Guard," said JWB, a St. Bernard Parish resident, "And he told me, swear to god, that the year before Katrina he was ordered to go out to the levees and bury dynamite. They didn't blow it up then. But they did for Katrina."

"No matter what you heard, saw, or read about Katrina, it was much worse than that," KM said.

DB has gardened is her life. From seeds, scraps, and branches DB has coaxed out an entire perennial paradise. All of the plants have a purpose, though -- "Butterflies like pizzas and hummingbirds like ice cream cones," DB says, explaining the shapes of the flowers in her garden.

Behind his gutted, rotting house, JY keeps chickens. He and his wife bring their kids out to see chickens several times a week, to feed and water them. It turns out, he discovered, that the city has a limit on how many animals a person can have on the property: four. He culled the flock down from a dozen to the city's prescribed limit.

VG: (paraphrased) Actually, CNN was one of the first news agencies to report the levees breaking. X was in a community center with her cameraman. Suddenly the councilwoman from the Ninth Ward rushed inside and yelled, 'Please, come quick! People are dying!' So X and her camera man followed the councilwoman up to the Claiborne bridge, I think. All the electricity in the city was out so it was pitch black and they couldn't get any visual footage, but they could hear it. Standing on the bridge, surrounded by a pitch black, muggy night the reporters and councilwoman could hear the sound of rushing water, a deluge, and the screams of thousands.

"I was at a bar the other night and this guy sitting next to me asked me where I was from," AO said, "And when I said I was here for a year with AmeriCorps he said, 'Get out now. Because if you don't, you'll never leave.'"

"This town doesn't like to drink," JC said, "it likes to be drunk." But, "All the things that are great about this city are starting to go away. I mean, some policemen are starting to bust you for drinking on the streets... They're getting after bars because their bands for being too loud."

"I don't like New Orleans, actually," admits JY. JY received a great deal of money from Road Home, but could only use it to elevate the house. There are specialized services in New Orleans for elevating houses. JY told the contractor to raise the house as far as he could with the  tens of thousands of dollars he received from Road Home. This turned out to be nine feet. None of the money could be used to build anything else, even a staircase. The only way to get into the gutted house, now, is with a ladder.

JY laughed and explained that he tells his friends they can store things in his house if they want to. No one can get in it, not without a ladder. It's the safest place to store things.

Author of Showdown in Desire, Orissa Arend, spoke at Fair Grinds Coffee. She described a shootout between the New Orleans Police department and the local chapter of the Black Panthers. It appears, from witness reports, that the police issued no warning and, without provocation, shot at the house for a half hour before the Black Panthers inside were allowed to surrender and leave the building. Miraculously, no one was hurt or killed. One Panther said he spoke to a black officer at the scene. They echoed one another's words, "Sorry, but I'm on this side." And then the started talking about the Saints.

"... I don't think I've ever been in a place full of happier people than when Drew Brees paraded as king of Bacchus one week after the Saints won the Super Bowl," said SD. "The happiness of the crowds that night was unbelievable, and I'm so glad I was able to be a part of such a great celebration--even if I didn't get one of the mini footballs Drew was throwing from the float."

"I get the impression that people came here to have a parade and a city got in their way," NF said.

"The great thing about this place is you can be anything. You can do anything," JC said. "I could decide to be an astronaut tomorrow and I could do it. I've never wanted to, but I could."

On the run and Announcements

To Alex Epstein,

When asked at his reading, "What is the one question you always wanted people to ask you?" the very very short story writer laughs and reads another story. That evening, from his silent hotel room, he calls home. His cousin asks, "What's it like sleeping without the sound of interstate?"

#

Allergies and time are killing me.

That said, a quick announcement: my short story, "The Law of Gravity," will be published in Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine issue 56. Don't know yet when it will be published, but will keep you posted.

--logue

(We see Sam Ferree and Samuel Beckett standing, slightly toward audience, in thought.  Ferree is perplexed.  A dark, grey stage.  No windows.  No doors.  The hint that they are contained; not outside.  There is a wooden table, rectangular, and two squeaky chairs.  A pitch black velveteen box sits on the table.  Two glasses, an empty glass pitcher.  An unlit melted candle.)

                                                            FERREE

What?

                                                            BECKETT

I don't believe I said anything.

                                                            FERREE        

Oh.  I thought you did.

                                                            BECKETT

You thought?

                                                            FERREE

Yes.

(Pause.)

                                                            FERREE

Sam Ferree.

                                                            BECKETT

Sam Beckett.

(They shake left hands, realize their mistake and shake right hands.)

                                                            FERREE

You can call me Sam.

                                                            BECKETT

Alright, Sam.  You can call me Sam.

(A pause.  They contemplate.  Ferree laughs and quickly stops when he sees Beckett's grave                                                                             expression.)

                                                           

                                                            FERREE

Sorry.

                                                            BECKETT
I forgive you.

(Pause.)

                                                            FERREE

Do you want a cigarette?

                                                            BECKETT

Yes.  I would like one.

                                                            FERREE

I'm out.  I smoked the last one a few minutes ago.

                                                            BECKETT

Smoked the last of what?

                                                            FERREE

A few minutes ago.

                                                            BECKETT

Were they good?

                                                            FERREE

There was just the one.  But yes, it was good.  It reminded me of the first time I smoked.

                                                            BECKETT
When was that?

                                                            FERREE

I don't remember.  But I was heart broken.

                                                            BECKETT

Oh.

(Beckett removes rolling paper and filters from his jacket.  He does this as if discovering them while                                                                   digging through his pockets for change, but is not surprised to find them instead.)

                                                            BECKETT

All we need is tobacco.

                                                            FERREE

That's progress.

                                                            BECKETT

What's in the box?

                                                            FERREE

A Macguffin.

                                                            BECKETT

I want it.

                                                            FERREE

So do I.

(They walk over to the box..)

                                                            FERREE

I'm afraid.

                                                            BECKETT

Don't worry.  I'm here by your side.

                                                            FERREE

But what if it's empty?

(Beckett opens the box, withdraws a plastic baggy of tobacco.)

                                                            FERREE

That's a relief.

           

                                                            BECKETT

I was afraid too.

                                                            FERREE

You were very brave.

                                                            BECKETT

Thank you.

(Beckett sits down.  The chair squeaks.  He starts to role the tobacco, carefully, precisely.  Ferree                                                                         watches with growing amazement.)

                                                            FERREE

I just read your play.  Endgame.  I don't think I really got it.  (Pause.)  That's the perfect amount of tobacco.  (Pause.)  They say you write it in French to dumb down the language.  To get to the bones of the apocalypse.  (Pause.)  I can never roll that well.  (Pause.)  Where was I?  Oh, the end of the world, right.  I think about the world ending a lot - what I'd do.  There wouldn't be much, would there?

(Beckett hands Ferree one of the rolled cigarettes.)

                                                            FERREE

My god, man!  What an immaculate cigarette!

(Ferree produced a lighter from his pocket and lights both cigarettes.  He pauses and stares at the laughter.  He laughs heartily.  Beckett chuckles.)

                                                            FERREE

It's good to laugh.

(Pause.  Beckett speaks as if they have been talking about happiness the whole time.)

                                                            BECKETT

Are you happy?

                                                            FERREE

I am now.

                                                            BECKETT

And before?

                                                            FERREE

I don't remember.

(Pause.  Beckett slowly makes a circle in the air with his cigarette.)

                                                            BECKETT
What?

                                                            FERREE

What?

                                                            BECKETT

Oh.  Nothing.

End