the clinking of glasses

Last Monday, sitting in a tiny office in the far reaches of Covina, I wrote the date on a note I was leaving for a prospective client—“02/22/2010.” Last Monday marked exactly two years of me being back home from my 11 month trip overseas.

The way things are.

The hardest part is accepting where you’re at. 5 people step into an elevator. Half way between floors 8 and 9 the elevator stops and the lights go out. Panic. People are not ok with being in the elevator, and they think back to 10 seconds ago when they weren’t in the elevator. That was a better time. They want to be there again. They want to be forward, in a future when they’re no longer in that elevator. Still, they are in the elevator.

The clinking of glasses, the tapping of silverware on porcelain plates, the shuffling feet of bus boys running around to clear tables for a packed lobby waiting to sit. Do you remember this? The smell of freshly made dishes, rich in cream sauces, battered in butter, served with steaming hot rolls. The soft texture of pie as it sits on your tongue. Waiters and waitresses carrying on snip-it conversations, charming you for an extra 5% on their tip, and you happily giving. Drinks on the patio, warm summer nights, a feeling of freedom, carelessness and ease.

I am not an economist (as my bank account could very well tell you), but I do some economic forecasting…I dabble let’s say. I don’t do surveys, I don’t read the news (actually I do, but this goes better with my story), I don’t do statistical analyses for past quarters; I look at the lines outside of restaurants on Friday and Saturday nights as I drive by on my way home in my increasingly unreliable automobile. There are none.

When I left the country in March 2007, the U.S. economy was still booming. There were signs (i.e. some of my friends who should not have been allowed to buy homes…were being allowed and encouraged to do so.) of a decline, of a bursting bubble, but still, the car lots emptied and the car lots filled, and they emptied again. Overseas I had read articles, some mentioning squatters, massive foreclosures, shantytowns, but no matter how shocking, it was hard to imagine that things were that bad. When I arrived back home in February 2008, it was clear…things had changed.

In February 2008, none of the banks had crashed yet, Bush and his cronies were still talking about their “sound economics,” Greenspan was still infallible, and people acted as they always had. But then February turned to June, and I packed a bag and headed out for 2 months, hitchhiking across the country, meeting everyday people, with their everyday stories. Some of those stories were hopeful, many were not. Summer turned to fall, and with fall came the crumbling of the great walls of Jericho, and a very long winter ensued.

“I used to drive that BMW s-class, but I had to give it up. It just didn’t make sense anymore.” “Everyone’s taking a 3% pay cut at the factory, just so that everyone can keep their jobs. Never mind raises.” “You know, we’re just eating out less. Trying to save where we can. Little things, you know?” “Yeah, had to move home. Try to save some money and help out the family a bit.” Every day I walk into real estate offices and hear about the cars they used to drive, the houses they used to have, the insane number of agents they used to employ, and now, “We’re just trying to survive this time.” And they’re the ones that are still doing well compared to most.

Everyone wants to be positive. We elected Obama and we waited for change. 2008 flipped on its head, and 2009 became, “the year” the year we’d get back up, the year we’d show our resilience…but 2009 came and went, and everyone has sworn that 2010 really has to be THE ONE. It’s March, and it looks like there’s a long road ahead. Everyone wants to be positive, but the fact is, economically, it sucks out there. And all the while, the commercials keep playing, the reality shows keep boasting, the pop charts keep selling dreams that indirectly mock the greater population for not having those things, for not having those lives.

On Thanksgiving Day, while filling up my gas tank to go play basketball with my friends, something dawned on me, “I keep looking to the day I can go back to teaching, but what if that never happens? What if I can’t get into a program, or what if I do, but then I get laid off? Will I never be happy?” I decided that day that I would do everything I could to be happy now, regardless of my situation. It’s an adjustment, and it’s hard.

We’re stuck in a frickin’ elevator. (By the way, it’s a really really big elevator with bathrooms and kitchens and stuff so that we can survive.) But hey, no matter what the t.v.s might tell you, you are not alone. Everyone is struggling, everyone is trying to adjust to new lifestyles and refigure themselves, their values, their goals. Married couples, new parents, old parents, the unemployed, twenty-somethings, thirty-somethings, retirees, teens, brown, black, white, yellow, red, purple, but not aqua, ‘cause…who the hell is aqua?! Everyone is feeling about the same, so rest easy in that, and never mind what Madison Ave. wants you to think.

You want out of the elevator? Who doesn’t?! But while we’re in it, let’s make the best of it. Explore the elevator, get to know the cables, the buttons, the railings. Get to know the other people in here with you. Get to know yourself better. Build something in it, make a home here, because who knows how long it’s going to take to get things running, and who knows what floor you’re going to get dropped off on if it ever does start moving again.

Stop yearning for a past that is gone and out of reach, and stop hoping for a future so full of unknowns.