The Rogers News

Author: Chris

  • Looking for Work

    I saw this inspiring bit of information in my blog reader today:

    Magdy told the publication he sent out about 300 resumes, but landed just one job INTERVIEW. “Every day I send out resumés, both electronically and through the mail, and every day I receive responses that the law firms are not currently hiring,” he said.

    Magdy graduated from Michigan State University Law School and has an LLM from Washington University. (Link) Is it just me or does it not seem like he has to be doing something else wrong? One interview out of 300 applications. That is insane. I get one job offer or maybe a handful of interviews. But one – single – uno – interview. Wow.

    I should have gone to dental school.

    I’ve been ignoring a lot of negative news like this. Daily, blog reports of the number of associates and support staff being laid off by biglaw firms stream from top to bottom of my screen. Times are obviously tough. (It was just announced that Harvard lost 22% of its endowment.) The stock market is all over the place. The housing market has tanked. Jobs are few and far between.

    I’m babbling now. But it’s time to get on the ball. Find a job. The best one I can get, considering the times. This downturn in the economy could be an opportunity to get started on the right track. Good saving habits. Get a new (used) car cheap. Get a house cheaper. Get going. Grow up (scream, clutch face)! Not sure what that even means. Growing up that is. But that’s a whole other post. For now, it’s about the job hunt.

  • Open Hearts Heal

    The following quote from Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami has hung with me for a few days now:

    Reiko smiled too, cigarette in mouth. “You are a good person, though. I can tell that much from looking at you. I can tell these things after seven years of watching people come and go here: there are people who can open their hearts and people who can’t. You’re one of the ones who can. Or, more precisely, you can if you want to.”

    “What happens when people open their hearts?”

    Cigarette dangling from her lips, Reiko clasped her hands together on the table. She was enjoying this. “They get better,” she said. Her ashes dropped onto the table, but she paid them no mind.

    Having an open heart can be humiliating and humbling. It is much easier to sequester away what I most need to express — those feelings and emotions that hang on the tip of my tongue for what seems like hours. There are numerous times when I have sat face to face with someone with an entire well of words that I wanted to say, but I just couldn’t bring myself to speak. My mouth wasn’t dry. My brain was functioning. But there was something — maybe sanity or dignity or something that I will only be able to grasp much later in life — that holds me back.

  • Sitting Alone in My Kitchen

    Tonight is quiet. It is not lonely. Just quiet and alone. Accompanying my wandering thoughts is a steady rainfall that will soon become silent snow. The streetlights outside my window run along the entire length of my block in muted yellows. The cars that drive by sound like a coat zipper and their red lights blend with the yellow lights from above.

    It is raining and I am sitting alone in my kitchen.

    It seems darker outside than usual. And brighter inside. The fluorescent light above me is harsh and annoying — reminding me I am alone in my kitchen and it is dark outside. And raining.

    My pen casts a faint shadow on my yellow paper.

    Besides the rain and the darkness and the general sense of alone-ness, there is no football on television tonight. College or otherwise. I don’t like when there isn’t a football game on and I’m alone. It is what I watch when I don’t want to think. Don’t want to be involved in a story. Just want to observe distant collisions between others. Ignore my own.

    I read today that America may split into six separate countries. West Coast, Texas, East Coast, Northern States and a couple others. That seems insane like $4 gas. But that happened. And now I’m paying $1.72. So, everything ebbs and flows. The downfall of America today. The strength of the dollar the next. In my email today I read that I should travel to London. That the American dollar is at a five-year high against the British pound. Never mind that no one has any of the strong dollars. That billions are being spent by our government to save companies that should fail. That deserve to fail.

    Anyway. It is dark and raining. I am in my kitchen alone reading and wondering whatching the orange lights and listening to the zippers zip by my apartment.

  • Michigan Basketball

    I need to jump in now and become a fan of Michigan basketball, which I never have been. Ever. Even when I attended Michigan, I went to one game when my family was in town. I sat way up in the nose bleed section and probably spent more time talking, snacking and texting that actually watching Michigan win or lose.

    But the tide seems to be turning and, while I am not a huge college basketball fan, except during March Madness when everyone is, I think I can get into the games. We’ve got a new coach and, from what I saw last night, a lot of solid new players. Plus, I need a crutch with the impending close of a dismal football season and no possibility of a bowl game this year.

    I fully expected to get trounced by #4 ranked UCLA last night. I was going to play the punching bag at my UCLA friend’s house. Figured it would be a chance to hang out, drink a beer, and watch a game I was sure to lose. Then, we clawed back from a poor start. Down 9 to 1 I was laughing and writing the game of. Ten minutes later, there was a crumb of hope on my otherwise empty plate. Very empty plate.

    So, off to a 3-0 start. Not much, but far better than the last decade. Perhaps we’re finally shrugging off the Chris Webber fab-five curse.

    Now, #2 Duke tonight. Yeesh. Maybe I spoke too soon!

    GO BLUE!

  • Cracked Heart

    His heart was cracked. With each slow breath of dry Midwestern air he winced. His eyes watered, not only from sadness, but from the shriek in his chest. As he lay picture still in his room his mind replayed what went wrong and forgot to remember what went right. The pain made him numb. Except for the cracked heart, which was un-numb-able.

    Sometimes when she was not looking he tried to push the fractions of his heart back together. He would place his left palm on the left side of his ribcage and his right palm on his sternum. Then he would feel with his fingertips for the crack deep beneath tissue and bone and press his palms firmly together. He did this until beads of salty sweat stung his eyes and his butter-cream complexion was splotchy red. Nothing in his life had been so hard as this.

    *****

    I wish I could pound my chest like a savage beast and break my own heart, but that is not how fractured hearts work. Instead I am left to mend it myself and to hope she will lend a hand when I grow weak.

    Written from 11:11 pm to 11:31 pm on Tuesday, November 18, 2008 in my apartment in Concord, NH.

  • How Coffee Works

    More like how caffeine works. And you’ll find a much more thorough explanation here, where I read about this. But here is the gist:

    • If you have never consumed caffeine before, it will initially increase your focus.
    • Saturation of this increase occurs after just two to three weeks of consumption.
    • At that point, the caffeine no longer increases your focus. Instead, you need it to reach your normal level of thinking.
    • Drinking more coffee will not further increase your focus once you’ve reached the saturation point.
    • Merely abstaining for five to ten days will return you to normal levels form saturation levels.

  • Self-Conscious: Part 2

    I dream a lot. Even while awake. It is one of the only ways, besides camping alone, that allows me to escape the obviousness of everyday life. Dreaming reminds me that even if I know everything that is going on with those around me that I still remain a mystery to myself. I can still feel alone. Others may know me better than I know myself. I can not help that. No one can.

    I walk to work in my uniform dark gray suit and navy tie. I feel like I look sharp. Others take notice. A working woman glances my way, catching my eye for a brief moment. This happens everyday. To all of us. We are led on and let in to others lives, if only for broken shards of time. She has grass green eyes, which makes it seem as if I am staring straight through her head to the lawn behind. An imperceptible shudder refocuses my attention on the sidewalk ahead. The woman is past.

    “I would like an everything bagel toasted with egg and cheddar. And an orange juice. Please. Thank you.”

    “You won’t get fat.”

    I chuckle. She is always direct. At least she is that way with everyone and not just with me. I have put on a few pounds since law school. I have not seen the gym in awhile. She knows that as well as I do. That knowledge does not stop either me from ordering or her from serving. Our worlds go around.

    As I leave the The Hole, an establishment not only in my life, but in this town, I flash back to this bagel place I used to frequent that sold pizza bagels and for a moment I want to be in college again. Young. Goofy. Riding my bike.