WEEKJOB: COMPUTER-SOFTWARE SALES
LOCATION: VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA
ANOTHER MONDAY MORNING. Sitting in rush-hour traffic in Vancouver en route to yet another first day on the job, I was exhausted. It’s hard to change jobs every week. As soon as I got settled in a position, Friday came. I said my goodbyes, and it was time to start all over again—new location, new dress code, new co-workers, new boss. Most people dread their first day of work. I’d already had ten, and if I could keep this going, I’d have many more.
I came back to Vancouver because my best friend, Ian, was getting married the following weekend, and I was going to be his best man. I took my first office job, at a Vancouver company called SustaiNet Software Solutions that sells computer software.
I wasn’t looking forward to it. I got into town on Friday, packed up a small backpack of clothes, then immediately headed out for Ian’s bachelor party weekend, which didn’t end until after one o’clock Monday morning. I woke up five hours later (thankfully in my own bed) and then left for work.
It felt weird that my friends were starting to get married. That we were approaching that stage in life. It’s funny to think that there’s an age at which we start to feel we should get married. Before long, friends would discuss having babies at the same time so that they could go for walks in the park together, chat on wooden benches while watching their kids play on the jungle gym, and not be the only ones at the party who had to leave before 8:00 P.M. Me, I was just trying to get through my first day at the office.
I thought of offices as the places where “real jobs” happen. Here is my desk. Here is my computer. I come here to work. On the wall there is a clock. When the clock says 5:00 P.M., I stop work and go home. No more work. When I work outside of that nine-to-five box, I somehow feel rebellious.
I liked the idea of offices. It seems to attach a legitimacy to the job. I’d definitely enjoy saying things like “Just send it on over to my office” or “I’ll call you when I get into the office.” And having meetings in boardrooms with big comfy leather chairs, congregating around the watercooler, discussing who got kicked off Survivor the night before. In theory, I thought offices were great—they bring people together and facilitate communication so that more can be accomplished. I just didn’t think I could do it every day. Then again, I’d never tried it.
I arrived at the ninth-floor downtown office and met my boss for the week, Howard. He appeared to be somewhere in his fifties. Balding and bearded, he had a great smile and a lot of energy.
“Hey, Sean, welcome!” he said in a South African accent.
The office was unsurprisingly office-like. There were desks, chairs, computers, stationery, a coffee machine, and a couch for visitors with scheduled appointments. Howard led me into his office, and I took a seat across from him at his desk. His office seemed pretty standard, with a few personal touches: pictures of Howard skydiving and riding horses; a family portrait on his desk. The choice of floor lamp instead of typical overhead fluorescent lights added a human element. Hip but office-like, I decided.
We discussed the history of the company, and I sat in on the weekly Monday-morning meeting. Then Howard showed me to my work space. I took a seat, and he handed me an informational booklet about the company. “Here, Sean, have a read. This will give you a better idea of what we do here,” he said, then returned to his office.
I glanced down at the pamphlet, “SustaiNet Software Solutions.”
“Okay, here we go,” I said, attempting to pump myself up. I looked to my left and saw the watercooler across the hall. I got up, grabbed one of the paper cups next to it, filled it up, then returned to my desk and tried again. “Okay, now here we go.” I took a sip of my water and began reading. “SustaiNet Software Solutions is a distributor and implementer of web-based information management systems that are designed to assist organizations to efficiently manage the wide range of information gathered to achieve their environmental and social sustainability goals.” Yeah, I’m still not sure what that means.
After a few hours of reading through information on the software and on the protocol for the trade show we’d be exhibiting at on Thursday, I glanced up at the wall clock—11:30 A.M. My mind drifted. Could I be sitting at that same desk performing similar tasks at 11:30 A.M. one year later? I wasn’t sure that I could. Then again, maybe it’d just need to be the right task. Howard appeared to love his job. He owned the company and so was more invested in its growth. He was very motivated, and he got excited when he talked about the company. He knew where he wanted to take it.
It must be nice to have a routine, I thought. But I wasn’t quite ready for it. I found that a routine took away much of my preoccupation with day-to-day decision making, thus granting me far too much time to question myself and my lack of direction. At that point in my life it was much easier to just keep moving, exploring, trying new things.
By Friday, things hadn’t gotten much more exciting than they were the first day.
My co-workers were great. They were very generous with their time and fun to be around. It was my cubicle that I disliked. But the reality was, I couldn’t possibly learn the skills of the other employees and implement them in only one week, so I didn’t get to do any of the interesting things that probably make their jobs worthwhile.
I spent the majority of my last day at my desk, inputting contact information from business cards we picked up at the trade show the day before. Leads, as the industry calls them. Howard said he’d come and grab me at the end of the day, but it felt like I’d been trapped in a business-card abyss for hours. I was beginning to think that when I finally emerged from my dwelling all the lights in the building would be off, chairs would be neatly tucked in, and everyone would have gone home for the day. I’d have to maneuver through a maze of red laser beams to avoid setting off the alarm.
It had been a quiet day. The confines of my cubicle and the dull, calming hum of the overhead fluorescent light fixtures got me thinking. Did I genuinely believe this next year would help me figure out what I wanted to do with my life, or had I just figured out a creative way to trick myself into believing it would? Was this all just an elaborate form of procrastination in which I could continue to hide from myself, escape my fears, silence the external pressure of others, and avoid getting a real job?
Those who know me well say I live in a dream world. My friends call it Sean’s World. A place where anything is possible and “happy thoughts” decide whether things go right. In other words, Neverland.
I questioned whether I should give up on my fairy-tale adventure and stop trying to convince myself that I’d actually be better for this experience. I wasn’t the first to have doubts about my direction in life or to question the status quo. Surely most people went down this same path at some point, struggled with the same decisions, asked themselves the same questions. And, judging solely by the number of times I’d hear others complaining about their jobs, perhaps most had come to the same conclusion: That is just the way it is. Accept it. Get a real job.
I’ve yet to figure out what makes one job any less “real” than another, but I have a strong suspicion that to be accepted as a real job, it has to be something you don’t enjoy. Furthermore, that it requires formal attire and time spent sitting in traffic. To have a job that I love and at the same time make enough money to live the lifestyle I want would almost make me feel guilty—as if I’d somehow be cheating the system.
Guilty or not, that was the goal I’d set out to achieve. But what if I didn’t find it? I’d taken that first step, put myself out there, opened myself up for criticism and adventure, but what if I tried my hardest and still failed? Then what? Would I have to accept a more mundane means of existence?
A year earlier in Thailand, I’d met a man who said he was a lot like me when he was my age—idealistic, set on finding a passion rather than a career. Then he went to business school, got the large salary, the Porsche, the big house, and the girl, and left behind his ideals.
“What changed?” I asked. “Why did you have to give up on your ideals?”
Although he was only twenty-nine, he sat back in his chair like a wise old man. “You will find out yourself one day,” he said.
I smiled, then politely replied, “I hope not.”
But that was just it. I hoped not. Sometimes I felt naïve to want these things, to believe that it was possible. Perhaps one day I too would learn to compromise my ideals and accept a job that I wasn’t passionate about.
But this belief, this hope, that there was something more—was the one thing that kept me going. And, for the time being, allowed me to silence any doubts about the project.
The sound of approaching footsteps broke the incessant hum of the overhead fluorescent lights and brought me back to reality. Howard popped his head into my work space. “Hey, Sean, that’s all for today. Time to go home.”
I packed up my things and headed for the elevator. The window at the end of the hall granted my first glimpse of the outside world since lunch. And what do you know, it was still light outside after all.