Prioleau Alexander - You Want Fries with That?: A White-Collar Burnout Experiences Life at Minimum Wage

A White-Collar Burnout Experiences Life at Minimum Wage

PRIOLEAU
ALEXANDER

Arcade Publishing
New York

Copyright 2008, 2011 by Prioleau Alexander

All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without the express written consent of the publisher, except in the case of brief excerpts in critical reviews or articles. All inquiries should be addressed to Arcade Publishing, 307 West 36th Street, 11th Floor, New York, NY 10018.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file.
ISBN: 978-1-61145-045-3

Printed in the United States of America

For my friends James Raymond, Mark Russell, John Tison, and Keith Korman and my wife, Heidi. Thanks for believing.

If you want to hear God laugh, tell him your plans.

Life is a funny thing, and you should never put off until tomorrow what you can do today. So, this seems to be a good time to acknowledge the friendship of the men whove made my life the nonstop adventure its been: Big T, Tom, John, Gator, Champ, Dove, Capt-Ian, Micky, Mac, Slasher, Iron Mike, Gooner, Doe Eyes, Marine, BD, Pucky, AT, Roomie, Hemi, Elf, Zem, Not-so, Cookie, Drummy, Porter Bill, Striker, Lee, III, Chang, Gunner, Fostah, Dennis, Jay, Frain, Russ, Douglas, Art, The Colonel, BellBoy, BobbyB, Brant, Donny, WorstCase, Captain Sease, Major C, Gern, Labby, Moose, TR, Spreaded, Yang-Ying, McCloud, Yoda, Geoff, DavO, Patch, The Wayne, Jamie, Jimmy, Scooter, Gus, Clark, Robb, Astro, Gerv, Paaarka, Gus, Tombo, Dogg, Rude, Jim, DA, Theo, Todd, Gilly, Stink, Fran, Willie, Robo, Hank, Tummy, Tin Cup, PJ, Dorsey, Davy, Moby, DanO, KC, Christian, Woodrow, JLK, Ken, Eric, Maestro, Johnny, David, Matt, Gaddy, Al, Rick, Chase, Smoak, E, Wolfe, Tim, Dr. PFP, The Marines of the Loose Deuce, Mitch, Chip, Johnny Mac, Tuga, Rrrrick, Hunter, Brennan, Beecher, Ron, Colonel Flag, Charles, Peet, and my nephews Will, Gordon, James, Hayden, Ben, Henry, Joshua, and Mason. I blame each of you for the warped worldview that shouts from the pages of this book.

On May 31st of last year, I quit.

Walked away.

Split.

At age forty-one, I leapt from the stern of the foundering SS Willy Loman and began my swim against the tide, leaving behind my health insurance, paycheck, and annual bonus.

What inspired this plunge? Its a long and horrific tale, but the blame lies mostly with my chosen profession the advertising and marketing industry which is a unique business in a suck-the-life-out-of-you sort of way. In reality, many issues within the profession broke me, so lets skip the excruciating details and cut directly to the chase. The big issues were:

1. Advertising is one of the few businesses where clients hire you for your expertise and creativity, only to then begin micromanaging your work to the point of submolecular deconstruction. This gets a bit tiresome after a decade or so... especially when they are taking net 90 to pay their bills.
2. It is also one of the few businesses that produces marked, measurable results, which are somehow invisible to the people who paid for them:

YOU: Howd the new ad campaign do this week?

CLIENT: Okay, I guess. Couldnt really tell.

YOU: Do you want us to keep running it?

CLIENT: No.

YOU: Why not?

CLIENT: For some reason, people came in and bought our entire inventory.

1. And the big one? The advertising game is the only business on the planet where potential clients think theyre doing you a huge favor by giving you the opportunity to work for them for free. This occurs when, with great pomp and ceremony, a desirable advertising client announces they are undergoing an agency review, which allows advertising agencies to pitch their business. What does this entail? Its too mind-boggling to describe realistically. Instead, let me offer this analogy from the legal profession:

CLIENT WHO NEEDS A LAWYER: Thank you for coming today, gentlemen. I see we have four different law firms represented. Excellent. As you might know, Ive been charged with trafficking in cocaine, conspiracy to commit murder, and attempted bribery of a federal law enforcement officer. And Im guilty. So, Ive called you all together to offer each of you the chance to work for me. In three weeks, each of you will be allowed to present your detailed ideas for my defense, which you will argue in front of a mock jury of my choosing. I will pick one firm to represent me, and that firm will get paid for the work theyve already done. The rest of you will be paid nothing... but you can take pride in knowing you had a reputation good enough to be invited to this pitch. Are there any questions or comments?

LAWYERS: Just one: if you have a choice, tell your cellmate you want to be the husband.

Another reason for skirting the excruciating details of my life in the ad game is that youve likely been there too. You know the drill: no matter what your job, if you make good money then its virtually guaranteed youre swallowing grenades for clients or bosses who dont appreciate your efforts. You endure the madness for the opportunity to make more money, because more money buys more stuff.

Yes, yes, we all know there are some people who love their jobs... but only the really lucky folks grow to love Big Brother and connect with his communiqu that SLAVERY IS FREEDOM and WAR IS PEACE... As for the rest of us, we trade our time for the necessities, luxuries, and conveniences that money buys. The new me, dog-paddling away from my sinking ship of security, figured a person could just eliminate the luxuries and conveniences and get by on the necessities with barely any income at all. After all, our forefathers settled the American West without new clothes or fancy dinners every week, so why not adopt a similar attitude and lifestyle? Just stop spending so damn much money, learn to appreciate the simple things in life, and be like that dude on Kung Fu.

My friends failed to understand the brilliance of The Plan.

That was their problem, of course. They didnt get it. They didnt understand the Zen of it all. Mine would be the life of Jimmy Buffett, where margaritas flow from the garden hose, and the soul feeds at leisure on a healthy diet of sunsets, steel drums, and pithy anecdotes of the simple life. A new life was beginning... a life of adventure, and discovery. It would be a life in the unknown.

Unfortunately, it takes only a couple of months of life in the unknown before several things became very well known:

1. No matter how much you hunker down financially, there are still a few bills that have to be paid, pesky little nonnegotiable items like home insurance, car insurance, life insurance, flood insurance, personal articles insurance, catastrophic health insurance, prescriptions, property taxes, car repairs, home repairs, water bill, electric bill, phone bill, DSL connection, cell phone bill, pest control, in particular termite control, vet bills, and IRA/HSA savings. Friend, that stuff logjams quickly when you dont have a paycheck... and if youll look at the list, youll notice there isnt a dime budgeted for suntan lotion and margarita mix. Those are bills you have to pay just for the right to suck air here in the land of the free, which, by the way, aint.