No Title.

I hear today they were laying people off at work.

I have, of course, already taken the "voluntary separation" package, along with a co-worker here in Charlotte.

The other day during the department meeting the big boss just dropped the bomb on everybody, totally surprising me, because I thought the plan was at least for me to say it.

I think that it was minimally shocking to the staff, but there was nary a peep when she said it. My co-worker and co-quitter was out sick. The big boss asked me if I had anything to add. I said, not really, and then gave a standard schpiel about missing everyone and bla bla bla. The whole thing was kind of anti-climactic. I had hoped to go out with more of a bang.

Then today I hear through the grapevine they're laying off the secretaries. The four that have been there the least long, the longest of which was about five years.

I had planned to write this heartfelt departure email, meant to tug at their heartstrings and give them a little hope in these troubled times at the agency. Now in light of these layoffs, I don't know that I will.

I hardly even talked to the Big Big Boss about it, and it was an awkward little chat. But she's got a lot on her mind too, my reconnaissance shows.Meanwhile everything is changing and the organization, and the management of clergy and big wigs has no idea what they're doing or how the place actually gets run.

I'll be so glad to get out of there! However I am so nervous about the job market. I talked to this woman today at a fancy resume referral place (basically a glorified temp agency) and she asked if I was still working for "the Church" in "New York". I explained that I now work for the Church in Charlotte, and that I live in Charlotte. It made me reconsider my resume: maybe de-emphasize "Church" and "NYC" so I'm not disregarded as some damn evangelical yankee coming down here stealing jobs.

She said keep in touch about the job I was calling about, but they already have sent them some resumes. I asked if she might keep me on file for future positions and she said she would. She sounded like a major bitch.

Michael Jackson's Will

Lots of people out there talking about Michael Jackson's will (.pdf) and how he left his former wife out of it, and doesn't mention his dad, etc...but why has no one pointed out that he put his kids in the care of Diana Ross if his mother Katherine was unable or unwilling? I found that interesting.

Mortality and TMI

I am already somewhat preoccupied with thoughts of death -- not necessarily my own death, but that too. To quote Anne Sexton, who was also consumed with thoughts of death (and, unlike me, suicidal thoughts), "Death's been here for a long time."

In recent days death has been at the forefront of the news with the passing of Ed McMahon, Farrah Fawcet, and Michael Jackson (the latter of which has already been venerated beyond that of kings and prophets...he may be buried in a pyramid). And now pitchman Billy Mays to boot!

All are sad losses, as is any death really, all those countless deaths that happen every day to people we don't know. A friend's dad died recently to boot, and his death is as important to me (and of course, my friend and her mother) as the death of any celebrity. Of course he was not an international superstar so an obituary in the Charlotte Observer was all that was warranted alongside some private grief...a luxury that the families of Ed, Farrah, and most notably Michael don't get a whole lot of.

For Ed McMahon, I felt a sense of sadness of course, but also a sense of calm at the normality of his deaath. He wasn't drug addled, or tortured by his fame and fortune, or even surprising. I don't mean to diminish what his friends and family must be feeling at all, but he was old -- and that is the way we're all "supposed" to go -- death by old age.

Farrah and Michael on the other hand, were somewhat surprising and shocking. Farrah, a victim of cancer, and Michael a victim of, for lack of a better word, "lifestyle". (I detest the word "lifestyle" as mentioned in my Adam Lambert post, but work with me here.) Then Billy Mays apparantly fell victim to a freak accident at a young age -- the same age as Michael.

I think this particular series of deaths has made me think even more about mortality and what lies beneath the thin veil of human survival is that I have a little in common with the last three. Similar to Farrah (but luckily not actual cancer), I have had "precancerous conditions" that will require monitoringg for the rest of my life (and it's just obscure enough that I will have trouble finding anyone here in Charlotte who knows what I'm talking about, which was a major consideration before I moved but I moved anyway). Like Michael, I certainly do not have the best mental, sexual or physical health. And like Billy, I'm prone to freak accidents.

This all comes up at a time, too, when I'm facing a major lifestyle change. The thought of having no income -- which will happen in the next sex or seven months -- scares me, and while I will be full-time job hunting (and trying to exploit some ideas I have for business and income generation), I will be thinking about the death of that period of my life, and how somewhere up ahead in the timeline death waits inevitably for me, and for us all.

It's freaky to be alive knowing that one day you won't be.

Michael Jackson, 1958 - 2009

I was sincerely shocked and saddened to learn that Michael Jackson died yesterday. Some of my earliest memories are of Michael Jackson in his hey day – the era of Thriller, the sparkling glove, the steps lighting up in the “Billie Jean” video, and my brother owning the “Beat It” zipper jacket.

All of the eulogies include a bit about the inescapable fact that Michael Jackson became increasingly weird over the years. The internet is filled with a sense of profound loss over the death of Michael Jackson, many with the caveat that his scandals should not diminish the memory of his greatness.

I have read disagreement, as well, with something I believe to be simply and obviously true: Michael Jackson was a genius of the performing arts. As for his scandals, I think that he deserved the courtesy of their context. For one thing the way overblown “dangling baby” incident. Would my parents, for example, have been the subject of an international outcry for all the times I rode in the bed of a pick up truck, or for all the times I was literally flung into the air and caught on my way down?

Overshadowing his marriage to Lisa Marie Presley (who posted a very sweet blog on her MySpace about his death), his weird names for his kids, his baby-dangling, and his extreme physical transformation over the years were of course the child molestation allegations.

I am one of the few people on the Earth who still give him the benefit of the doubt over that. I of course was not there and do not know, but my perception has been that Michael was still searching for his lost childhood – he said as much on numerous occasions and even in song – hand that he was not a predator but infantile, asexual. Being a “weirdo” and unfathomably rich would make him a target for such accusations – and in many ways he set himself up for those accusation by allowing kids into his home, perhaps creepily acting as if he were one of them, and seeming to fail to grasp the concept of what made other adults uncomfortable with his interest in young boys. All that said, accusations of being a sexual abuser stick, true or not. And, true or not, it’s sad that those accusations will always be a part of his biography.

I am a little surprised by how sad I am over the death of Michael Jackson. He has been a bonafide superstar since before I was alive, well into my adulthood, with his pinnacle happening around the time I was becoming aware of my own identity. He was too young to die, yet too old to be rehearsing for his upcoming mega-shows in London. As someone else wrote (can’t find my source), he didn’t get a childhood or an old age.

RIP Michael Jackson

Very sad.

I Love Alaska

The thought of anyone seeing my search strings for the last five days, let alone the last five years, is kind of scary. This happened to 650,000 AOL users in 2006, when AOL inadvertently published a text file containing the contents of their searches (almost as scary is the fact that there were still 650,000 AOL users in 2006). Yet, I Love Alaska, a minimovie piecing together User 711391’s search strings into a story of sorts, is strangely compelling and heartbreaking.

Buffy versus Edward Cullen

If only! Better than the actual Twilight movie.

I took the offer.

Will be made known to coworkers when I return week after next.