Part 2, continued.

I then thought, “my case manager most likely has in her experience passed gas at one time or another, so I'll just play it safe, and pretend nothing has happened”.

That was a key for me in these difficult times: we are all human, and, therefore nothing human is alien to us, not even the embarrassing fact of passing gas!

I blandly passed the time scanning items such as books, even moving some items to clearance, as I was instructed to do.

Then one day, I was wearing a little pouch on my neck, and I misplaced my keys If I recall correctly.

I was frantic! I did not know what to do. I carefully retraced my steps throughout the warehouse, wondering if I somehow locked them in my new locker.

In my mind, I knew I did not do that, but I gently concurred that that it was a possibility, and I of course, your hero, was very gaseous.

My case manager eventually found my keys, and I was overjoyed, calling them “my little precious babies”, or something to that effect.

I was immediately horrified that she thought I had been talking about her, not my keys!

She just laughed. And smiled politely.

A few minutes later, I was called by another supervisor to see if I could successfully remove hard drives from donated laptops, which I was able to eventually somehow or another able to do.

There were thousands of laptops, and I had a dream of doing nothing but laptops, all day, day after day. Month after month. Year after year…

I was rudely awakened from my reverie, and told kindly, quite kindly as matter of fact, that seeing how one of my “E-Commerce Associates” had the key to the main computer room, which was in fact, just a large chain-link fence surrounding the area, and it was in a large warehouse. So, I trudged blearily back to books, hiding although not too well my disappointment.

END OF PART 2

My life thus far at Goodwill: or, the good, the bad, and the doctor's prescribed bathroom breaks.

It's interesting to note that I never ever wanted a job-as “jobs” per se usually denote responsibility, and I thoroughly pride myself on not having responsibility to speak of.
But after 13 years of not contributing in any meaningful way to society except for writing, exercising, and being a brain injured man of leisure, after seeing how much physical money one of my housemates was making, I opted for the coin of the realm, so to speak, and I applied there and went through the intake process. Incidentally, I had no idea that they wanted you to fill out a homeland security thingamajig. I was shocked, as I had never done this before, and I think since the events of 9/11, or so it seems to me, that homeland security does not want any illegals or terrorists applying for jobs and earning a living wage. Not that there is anything wrong with that, though. I think the women and men of Homeland  Security often do  a thankless job.
Back to the task at hand, writing about how I feel about  doing my part to lend a helping hand to people who might be in the same position that I once was, jobless and really needing a job, but only as much as the state in its infinite wisdom would permit me to make within a month.
I arrived for my job when I started February 21, 2012. I was bright eyed and bushy tailed, ready for anything and everyone, or so I thought.


Clearly, I was not ready in any way, for what they had me doing, which was scanning books-a process in which you identify either the I International Standard Book Number, or the barcode, beginning with the digit 9 physically scan it, and either accept it, in which case you'd put it in a certain stack neatly, or reject it, in which case, you'd laboriously toss the book into a large cardboard box.
It was very frustrating at 1st, plus I had awful gas and did not want anybody to notice it, but my case manager did and politely asked me if I needed to use the bathroom.
I shriveled in embarrassment, and humility-and I shrank away from her saying “No, thank you."

END of PART 1