First Jobs: Part 1

First jobs can be awful.  I’m not talking about the first jobs we all had as teenagers (baby sitter, newspaper deliverer, retail clerk, and “would you like fries with that?”). 

I’m talking about the newly minted college grad, first “real” job.  There you are, degree in hand and standing on the precipice of official adulthood. So much excitement, but so much pressure also.  You are anxious to land that first job for a variety of reasons.  To become independent.  To pay off your student loans. To really just take your place in the world and make your mark.

What that means is, a lot of the times you will take whatever job, just to have a job, and get started.  At least that was the case for me.

In my particular case, I had a degree in Political Science, intending to go to law school.  Once I decided to not go to law school though, I was like, well, now what? What kind of job can I get with a Poli Sci major?

I’ll tell you what kind of job you can get. Area Representative for Westinghouse Credit Corporation.  They paid me $16,000/year plus a company car.  Living large!

However, as I soon realized, this was the job from hell. 

Turns out that Area Representative was a euphemism for Bill Collector.  I quickly learned that all those mom and pop stores don’t own their inventory.  Companies like Westinghouse do.  The stores have a period of time to sell the goods before they start racking up interest. 

My job was to visit the stores we were financing, check the inventory to see if it was sold, collect a check for the sold goods and interest checks on the unsold goods.  Fortunately, I never had to do a repo, but that was part of the job description also.  Suddenly, law school was looking like a good idea again.

Ok, now that you have the context, let’s get to the funny part.  This is funny part, part 1.  Next week’s blog will be funny part, part 2.

One day, I had to go to the hinterlands of South Jersey.  The owner of an appliance store had had a fire in his store and moved all his inventory of air conditioners to his farm in Jersey.  

Took me forever to locate the place, it was truly in the middle of nowhere.  I knocked on the door of the house and the owner’s wife greeted me, saying her husband was not there, but that she would take me to the barn where the air conditioners were stored. 

As we were walking towards this big red barn (is there any other kind?!), we passed a pen with cute baby goats.  I commented about how cute they were. 

She replied, “Yes, they are.  However, that reminds me to tell you to watch out for Sven.”

Umm, excuse me, what?

“Sven,” she said, “is our big billy goat.  He can get nasty.” 

 And then, right on cue, who showed up but Sven.

“Oh dear,” she said.  “Hold on, let’s see if we can get these barn doors closed. Help me, will you?”

She and I then tried to shut the doors.  Sven wasn’t having it.  He just kept butting his head, with those big horns, against the doors as we tried to close them.

“Ok,” she said. “Stay right here.  He likes water.  Let me get the hose.”

Stay right here? Was she kidding?

Internally, I was screaming, “No, don’t leave me alone with Sven!”

Sven was eyeing me up, taking my measure.  I stood stock still, looking into the eyes of the devil.  I wondered, if like dogs, goats could smell fear.  If so, I was in trouble.  I was coated in eau d’scared shitless.  Neither one of us was moving. 

Suddenly the wife appeared behind Sven and was waving a garden hose that was spewing water.

“Here, Sven” she called. 

Sven could care less.  What’s water when you have fresh meat before you?

Sven took a step forward towards me, his eyes never leaving mine.  I took a step back.  Suddenly we were in a dance, he and I.  He would take one step forward.  I would take one step back.  One step, ever so slowly, at a time.  No sudden movements on either of our parts.  The wife was still waving the garden hose.

Forward, back. Forward, back. Like some macabre duet. Until the point that I realized I was cornered. 

My back was to the back of the barn wall.  I had a row of boxed air conditioners just waiting for me to check their serial numbers lined up about shoulder high on either side of me.  Sven’s eyes were still locked on mine.  I had a death grip on my clip board that had my paperwork and which I held like it was a Viking shield.  Sven was so big that his face was level with my chest.  He was inches from me. I could feel his breath.  He opened his mouth, reached across my arms….and started eating the paper on my clip board.

I shoved the clip board in his face, driving him back enough to where there was a gap in the boxes of the air conditioners where I could hoist myself over them and run like hell for the house.  Sven decided that pursuing me would be more fun than eating the paper, so he tore after me, hot on my trail.  I never ran so fast in my life. Usain Bolt could have taken pointers from me.  I barely made it into the house ahead of him. I slammed the door in his face, my entire body shaking.

The wife came sauntering in shortly after me.  I couldn’t be certain, but was I seeing a smile playing at the corners of her lips?

“Are you ok?” she politely inquires.  “I am so sorry about that.”

“I’m ok,” I answer.  But I will need to use your phone.  I need to call my boss.”

She points me towards the phone.  I call my boss.

“Barbara, I’m at the Jones’s.  I came to their farm to check their air conditioner inventory.  However, this job will not be completed today.  In fact, no other jobs will be completed today as I am heading home.  The goat ate my paperwork. Yes. A goat.  Yes.  All my paperwork for the day. Yes.  A goat.  They have a goat.  Goes by the name of Sven.  He almost ate me, but I was able to get a head start and ran faster than him. Good bye.  I will see you tomorrow.”

With that, I hung up and turned towards Mrs.  Jones.  “Mrs. Jones, I will be leaving now.  You can keep the clipboard.  I’ll get a new one at the office tomorrow.  I will not be finishing this job here today obviously. I will need to reschedule for some other time.  Hopefully, by that time, your store will be re-opened.”  No way was I ever going back to that godforsaken farm in the middle of nowhere Jersey.

With that, I made my way towards my company car.  Mrs. Jones had corralled Sven by that point.  As I pulled out of her driveway, I glanced back at her. There was no doubt she was smiling as I saw a grin on her face that stretched from ear to ear.  

I realized instantly it was no accident that Sven was loose roaming the property.  Mr. and Mrs. Jones were going to have a good chuckle that evening over dinner about how they pulled one over on their bill collector. 

Goat, 1.  Bill collector, 0.  Jones’ bank account, full of money.