Homeless Life

The topic of the day is petty, insecure people whom are easily threatened. Unfortunately, this one is a social worker. Luckily, I am not on his "caseload", but am a peon employee, paid (just above) minimum wage to bite my tongue during working hours.

Today I received a written reprimand for coming in an hour late on Monday. I work at a homeless shelter, we don't leave the homies to watch themselves, the guy who I relieved knew I got in on time, 30 or so residents saw me come in on time, and I knew I was in on time-but no one bothered to ask. Even though day light savings time is the same time every year. The offices are closed weekends so there is no way the time clock would have been changed until sometime Monday. And most likely not before I got in at 7am.

THREE employees' time cards showed them coming in late because of the inaccurate clock, but guess who is the ONLY one to receive a "written reprimand"?? Yep, sweet, little, innocent ME.

This has been going on for about a month- my boss has "forgotten" to include shifts, underpaying me. He asked if we staff felt comfortable teaching groups, I said no, I wanted to be trained first. First it was a question to me, then it became a question of his absolute authority. I left sick one day, and had someone else (a trained volunteer) cover the desk. He got angry because I left a message on his voice mail instead of having him paged to let him know I was leaving early. In the past month, the only way he has communicated with me is by letters he leaves in my mailbox, but avoids me in person.

Except today, he cornered me when I was at the BATHROOM door about something. I said "ok' about whatever he wanted and he acted like a testosterone driven teenager saying "yeah, it better be ok"!

This is sooo ridiculous. The Captains, HIS BOSSES love me and they've had several meetings with me asking me not to quit, that I'm an asset to the shelter and residents, etc. They said that they can't just fire him, but to make sure to document all of these things. For what?? For proof after I quit, when he begins to harass the next female employee? (no wonder they can't keep any!)

I love my job, that's why I've stayed even though I would make more at McDonald's (that's NOT an exaggeration!), but this guy doing double time spreading his asshole might be enough for me. I like my job, but it's not like my "dream job" or anything. I feel like I am too old for this kind of petty manipulation, and this guy has at least 30 years on me.

How are people HAPPY putting other people down and trying to make themselves look better by lying and manipulation? I don't get it. I hope I never "get it" actually.

Poetry

This is old(ish) but I'm going through my piles of half written pieces, doing revisions and putting them together in some type of order.

There is No Sex in My Poetry

When you left

so did the sex

in my poetry. The frustration

building

for years, sprinkling inanimate

objects in sensuality, giving them

life in a way that moved,

dancing into a sultry story.

My words are still chafed

and raw, but they are no

longer something private, shared

between us - they've become unattractive,

picked at scabs, or bleeding

sores.

My sex was light,

a distraction from

unspecified emotional pain, giving

way to eroticism, in blushing suggestion

of abuse, or

guilt.

My writing has become celibate.

The sterile stories must

hold their own descriptions, painting asexual

pictures. I cannot rely on

shock or disgust -

sex

that dirty word.

I spend more time in bed, alone,

my poetry far from

the space between

my legs,

or yours. Stepping out of its leather

and lace, dressing itself

in a shapeless frock, tying

it's tennis shoes. It has

walked away.

I've been looking forward to this month's edition of Poetry- my fave poet, Sharon Olds, is mentioned in an upcoming issue. Instead, the magazine feature about 5 poems by this barely literate lady, Kay Ryan. Her lines are short, only a few words, most of them have only 2 or 3 words. Which is fine, but when you have lines that short more weight is placed on each word, each syllable. Even worse, somehow this lady won the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize, which awards a poet like a million dollars (gross exaggeration) to help support his/her writing.

Blek.

Popping My (blog) Cherry

Since I spend one of my jobs perpetually faking it at the computer (I think typing appears more professional than reading an actual book), I decided I needed to more into the 21st (NERD!) century and get my own on-line outlet.

I'm sort of afraid to bring any of my poetry to work, and the computer here saves nearly everything,(in attempt to incriminate me for an un-Christian lifestyle, I am sure) but that's what I assume I'll end up writing most about. So in a way, I guess I am finally being paid to write. And not just SAT questions... Heh

In the past 24-hours I have set off the alarm here twice. TWICE. The police only came once; I haven't decide if I should be thankful, or worried about that. Bottom line: I'm a moron and can't be trusted with that much responsibility, at least not responsibility that involves sequencial numbers. I predict that by the end of the year, Young's Alarm Co. will be sending me a Christmas card, and possibly a small gift.