Dirty Jersey!

So I went on Monday to revisit the depths of last year's despair.  Last year's academic quest ended with a last second denial at Rutgers.  I was wait-listed, thus had to wait till the final hours of the April 15th deadline to learn my fate.  This year I've got this new strategy that places the ideal analytical lens below just getting in to a PhD program that allows me to get back to work.  That debate is the Sociology versus Anthropology debate.  I struggle with locating the division between the two in practical terms, but I tend to find more fulfillment in anthropological work and reading - seems closer to the ground.

Anyway, Rutgers is the only Anthropology school I've applied to this year.  Everything else is Sociology, with one political science program and one joint program.  Most of the places I've found do interdisciplinary work, and the people cross over well, but still Rutgers was my top choice last year, and it is hard to imagine it as anything but that this year.  It is tough though.  I am visiting a lot of schools and developing relationships with people and places.  My friend and the critical nature/perfectly structured program at York, the radical joint program at Northeastern, the anti-capitalist global critique of Binghamton, Boston College's focus on public sociology, the Cali schools, Pittsburgh.  There are really good people that I would really struggle to say no to.  Programs that all sound great.  Rutgers, always seems to rise above them though.  It pains me to say that, because I want to work with my friend in Toronto, etc.  But the program just fits.

On Monday I met with I think seven people.  My one friend and professor that I have been working with all year on Occupy.  Then several people I met last year and really like.  It was great to see them again as ther was an immediate familiarity and almost affection.  And then the new people!!  They were great.  The one works on media and the other is a joint criminology appointment.  So right there in addition to the engaged anthropology (i.e. using what you learn to bring change), and the focus on violence, conflict, Africa, American inequality, and with several people working on social movements, they now have the two buttresses of my Occupy project.  There is only four years of funding which is tough.  But your field work usually has funding through external grants and such, and mine would be in NYC most likely so wouldn't be such a challenge to handle.

The meetings went well.  I got some very good questions and had to find ways to frame things in different ways for each person to understand things.  I have two supervisors right off the bat that I would think would be fabulous!  I spoke with both of them for an hour at least.  One lives five blocks away from me here in Brooklyn!  Anyway, as is, this school search is tough, I have the applications in and should start hearing back from places any day now.  I had a positive email from UC Davis, and good visits throughout.  We'll see.  Rutgers would probably be the highest regarded program I applied to.  It would be tough to turn down.  But we'll see, so would York in Canada, and Northeastern in Boston, and Davis in Cali.  So it goes, assuming I get in - an assumption I've made before....

Much Respect Due

So within my new job I have had to work the cash register.  Wow.  I never knew how much respect the people doing that deserve.  Eight hours a day, five days a week.  I just did a two day stint and I tell you my body feels it.  My neck, my legs, feet, etc.

They have a very defined and regimented protocol for the register there.  When you get in, you go to the supervisors counter and get a little red bag full of the money for your register.  $288 in cash and change.  You count it, and put it in your drawer.  You get to your register, sign in, deposit your cash drawer in one of the two slots, and start ringing up people.  You do this then for hours.  You stand on the hard ground and just move your upper body back and forth, with only your hands using the touch screen device to enter produce PLU numbers, scan items, bag groceries, smile and send people on their way.

These shifts are eight and a half hours long, with a half hour unpaid break and a fifteen minute paid break.  I can tell you this too, you need those breaks.  You are not allowed to eat anything at the registers, but you can have water.  To go to the bathroom you have to call the supervisor and ask permission.  Usually you get to go right on the spot, sometimes you have to wait your turn while others are going.  I haven't been told no yet, but with a long line I could imagine someone may ask you to wait.  Talking among cashiers is discouraged and reprimanded.  It is agonizing physically, and trying mentally.

The first two hours seem to go fairly quickly.  You are ringing up people constantly and not physically hurting yet.  But all the concentration and standing takes a progressive toll.  My concentration and blood sugar levels seem to drop after a while and my ability to concentrate wains exponentially.  This is an obvious problem given the draconian policies for miss counting or not have you bills the right way in your drawer.  I have dyslexic moments, but so far I think they have been typing in the right produce code, and you can go back and change it.  But what happens when you have one with the cash?  I was short yesterday 80 cents on one transaction.  It was 62.84 and the woman gave me 65.04, I typed in 62.04 by accident, my mind was in a fog by that point, and the woman was really pushy.  She was treating me like I was just another subservient worker - beneath her - as is a common occurrence it seems.  She was saying its simple, the change is three dollars, she was wrong, but I didn't realize it until later.  I typed in another $3 to make the $65.04, her change should have been $2.20, and it said this, but the woman was bitching and badgering about $3 while I was trying to figure out my mistyped amount.  I gave her three only to realize a moment to late after she'd gone that it should have been $2.20 as it all added up.

I now see how common these interactions are.  Because this is a hard job.  It is so sad that all too often customers treat people at the register like morons because the type in the wrong PLU code, or miscount the change.  I would love to see all these executives and office types come down here and spend eight hours a day on their feet doing the same repetitive motion, counting on the fly, bagging, and scanning over and over for eight and a half hours.

To each customer this is their money, their food, their pain in the ass exercise in sustenance that they have to do, and want to do as quickly as possible between their jobs and getting home or to play in their free time.  They eagle eye you and have little remorse for the slightest mistake.  The cashier on the other hand is staring at a screen all day, doing the same thing over and over.  I have never had such acute blood sugar issues as with this job.  I have to eat something every two hours or I'm lost.  And I can feel it, I end up in this fog that is almost surreal.  Like you barely see the money and PLU codes as they fly by your eyes and hands.  I usually recognize the issue and grab my water or sneak a little something to get the sugar back.

Customers though don't see these ins and outs of the job.  They see the singular action, and see it as simple.  They don't see the eight hours and the pressure put on you for your job by the company.  They treat you like you are stupid because you are counting the change, reentering the PLU code or fiddling with the bag.  No, I think it's safe to say that the general public has little respect for this work, hence its low pay and prestige.  Apparently one customer who had to call over the manager at one point said to her daughter that she needed to go to school so she didn't end up as a cashier.  Right in front of the cashiers.  It is really sad to hear that, sad for society.  Yet still this is the society we live in.  A place where "menial labor" garners no respect even from those that so deeply and heavily rely on it for the very existence.  Whether you work for a company that employs cheap labor, or buy products that cheap labor makes cheap for you the world goes no where without people like supermarket cashiers, and its hard work, just like digging a ditch, mopping floors, building a roof, whatever.  Much respect due.  

The laws of the register

So I am going through training on the cash register for my new job. Wow. I don't ever want to be behind the register. I am scared to death of the draconian rigidity of the terms and rules, and how quickly the slightest slip – like not having all the bills facing the right direction – can lead to getting warned and fired.

They work on a system of a written warning, a final warning, and discharge.  In terms of being absent or tardy if you are:

• 3 times in 30 days, 
• 4 times in 90 days, 
• 5 in 6 months or, 
• 10 in a year,

you will be given a written warning that lasts for a year.  This includes sick days (though back-to-back days only count as one "incident").  If this happens you are on written warning for a year.  If in that time this or any other issue happens again (see below), you get a final warning (which last six months).  If in this time anything else happens you are "discharged" (i.e. fired).

So what is included in this?  Well with the register you are accountable to balancing your till.  If you are a penny off one way or the other 5 times in 30 days its a written warning.  Meaning no take a penny leave a penny, and if you're off by more than $5 on any one occasion it is an immediate written warning.  This means that you count wrong once, accept a counterfeit bill, whatever... you're on warning.  But it gets worse.  If within a 30 day period you have 5 instances of any of the below issues:

• excessive coins or cash
• bills not facing the right direction
• missing a coupon
• missing an EBT slip
• missing voided transaction slip
• miss entering a product code
• improperly filling out a traveler's check
• talking to the cashier next to you
• not asking to go to the bathroom
• coming back even a minute late on a break
• looking at someone the wrong way....... breathing.... ok, so I made that one up.

But really?!  You don't place the bills face up and all in the same direction!?!?!? or give someone a penny!?!?! and your in trouble!?  Enter the wrong code, give back the wrong change and in trouble you get!!!  No sir, not me.  Keep me off of that register.  My dyslexic, hypoglycemic ass would be done in a week.  I mean hypothetically speaking (and keep in mind schedules only come out Wednesday for the next week), if someone is late or sick more than 5 times in 6 months (keep in mind NYC subways, doctors, dentists, kids), and they don't put their bills all face up a few times and then take a counterfeit bill by accident, they're done.  No flexibility, only a lashing with the whip.  Amazing.    

Blue Collar State of Mind

So one thing that I did want to bring attention to with my new job is my inherent regression into ethnography.  I am working as a delivery boy.  This is of course not commensurate with my place in society - as an educated white man.  When I am out and about as a "white man" of seemingly respectable capacity, I am treated a certain way.  This became incredibly evident to me throughout my involvement with Occupy and the daily awareness of my place of power in the socio-economic system.  In those circles I am constantly reminded of it every day.  This is why it was so eye-opening - and dare I say refreshing - to be treated as just another blue collar worker once I donned my delivery apron and hat.

There are of course two aspects to this.  There is the way random people and the people you are delivering to treat you, and the way you are treated by other workers such as doormen.  No one really wants to be talked down to, or have assumptions made about them that aren't nice, but we all know this is bound to happen though.  The interesting thing for me is that knocking on doors as a delivery person immediately places you in a category that I am not in otherwise given the general demographic makeup of the delivery profession.  For example there was a woman the other day in a penthouse apartment that when I knocked on the door was very deliberately trying to not let me see in her apartment.  She came out and closed the door behind her, overtly showing an apprehension to me and what I might see on quick glimpse in corner penthouse apartment on the 40 something floor.  Now obviously there is a large amount of speculation here as to her motives.  But having been in the situation and reading it, I can only say that this was the way I felt and my interpretation given the visual and verbal cues I received, and coupled with my own place in society and thoughts.  Yet still, I felt that she did not want me to see in her apartment and also an apprehension towards me.  But hey, for all I know she had a cat in there or a naked man!  lol.

Anyway, my point is that if I was someone living in the building, or someone (eg. the person I am when I don't have my delivery hat on) that was not presumptively of lower income, but stereotypically of higher need/propensity to be "casing" the place, would she have acted to skeptically and with such reprehension?  My suspicion - however prejudiced it may be - is no she probably would not have.  Apprehensive of a stranger yes I'm sure, but if I came with a suit on and a handshake, versus an apron and an eye towards a tip, responses would be different.

Regardless though, this incident was not so much my main point as the way I am treated by other workers.  At pretty much every door thus far people have been friendly and good to me, offering both smiles and often enough tips.  But the big thing for me is the acceptance as a worker that I receive.  When I walk around my neighborhood - which is predominantly black - I am a white guy.  To the average person I am just another gentrifier.  I have to open my mouth and hope that my words sell me and allow me entry into "their club".  And my words do around here, hence my relationship with my bar and others.  However, always at first glimpse I am what I look like.

This is the same throughout the rest of my life.  When I walk into a high rise/rent building in midtown Manhattan when I'm not working, I look like I "should" live there (and yes, these people are pre-ju-dice). Door men treat me a certain way with lots of yes sirs.  And when I walk in to a upscale supermarket like where I now work I am treated the same, like just another wealthy enough white shopper.  But the minute I don that delivery apron and name tag, its like I am transformed into just another guy.  A guy that can be joked with, cursed with, and that other workers of similar stature can let their guard down with.

For me this is truly refreshing.  I do not feel comfortable in wealthier settings or with people of means and "proper" decor   I am much happier sitting around talking with people living real lives, with real struggles, that can just let themselves be free of some of those decorum things.  When I went to Binghamton and was sitting at a table of graduate students I had to be "educated", "intelligent", "on".  With "regular" people I can just be me.  I don't have to sell myself, I don't have to exude skill, competence  or confidence.  I can just relax.

The amazing thing about this is that as regular Tim Weldon I have to prove myself and work to get to this level of dialog with people, but as a delivery boy, I seem to innately already be there.  I can talk how I want, am talked to how they want, and talk about whatever any one of us wants.  There is also an inherent understanding and seeming bond through the unspoken struggle with power that is innately understood amongst "workers".  Statements about the people living there, the way they treat people, the way we are treated.  Mechanics, doormen, shop workers, janitors, whatever.  It is an ease of mentality and a welcome place of respite from the rest of the world that somehow thinks that because I am a white man that I should both be a certain way and be treated a certain way.  I like being a delivery boy, it lets me - if even just for a moment - be me with the people most like me.  

Visiting the future

In the last several weeks I have started visiting schools in an effort to assist my chances of getting in to a PhD program.  I have an extensive list of schools I am applying to and the costs of which are absurd.  But I'm all in - I MUST get in to a program - so I'm going to go sell myself to each one.  The dyslexic football player I am does not seem to look as good on paper as I do in person - as Rutgers reaffirmed to me last year.

So I have been to visit UCONN, York, and Binghamton thus far and will visit Boston College and hopefully Northeastern tomorrow, then Stony Brook on Thursday if anyone is around there.  Rutgers is having an open house on the 29th as well that I will go to.  The only schools left really then would be the west coast schools which I am hoping I can get to, or at least UC Santa Cruz and Davis in the first week in February.  Santa Barbara and Hawaii are a bit too far afield for my current means and time schedule so will have to be left to their own accord.

As it is, I am very happy with the meetings thus far.  (You can read more about UCONN here).  I almost feel like I'm back getting recruited for football again.  The schools have all gone out of their way to show me around and put out the red carpet.  After three visits, York in Toronto is head and shoulders above the rest.  It seems like an ideal program for me.  I met with the closest possible supervisor for me and got on well.  I have some reservations about a few methodology/theoretical issues, but with more information these may be completely resolved.  The fact is that she is an activist and scholar along my mold, just further advanced in her study.  I met with the head of the graduate program as well, and the admin person, and they were wonderful.  Not sure if its because they are Canadian or just that they are nice, but they were great.

I also was up there at the behest of one of my best friends who is doing a PhD in their program and that I know from Central European University in Budapest.  We are now working on very similar things, and frankly I may just want to go there to work with him, nevermind the eleven other faculty members with similar interests.  The program there is shorter - as they value my masters - there is six years of funding, and a flexible core structure that would fit perfectly into my skillset and dyslexic parameters.  Just one method and theory requirement of your choice - quite different from UCONN's two Quants and two Quals plus their courses.

Then of course there is Toronto, which at first glimpse left quite a bit to be desired.  But I as coming from Montreal - which was AMAZING, even under two feet of snow and a wind chill of -14 degrees Fahrenheit - so Toronto could just but subjectively leaving things to be desired.  I mean it wasn't bad, it just looked discombobulated and eclectic, like there was no zoning regulations and you could build anything anywhere not matter what it looked like compared to the thing next to it.  But we had good food, and the rents seem cheep.  I would do just fine there.

From there I went to Binghamton, NY.  I was just in and out and met with some grad students (I'd met with one prof in NYC last week).  They have a really good program for me.  It is very flexible, and you get to set much of it up as per your liking.  But there seems to be some difficulty within the faculty.  I mean the program is completely left and the right vantage point for me, but the faculty seems to struggle at times to work together.  The funding is also an issue.  The give three years of funding and it seems to be causing serious problems with students (I'm hearing the same things I hear from New School students).  The funding is supposed to cover through your comprehensive exams, but it doesn't  seem that anyone finishes them in less than four years.  And it also seems that a really "leftist" program as they describe it does not bode well in grant applications.  One person said grant fund organizations and the government just simply don't fund Binghamton projects and the types of projects coming out of there.  It's tough to hear as well, because Binghamton's core courses would be my electives elsewhere.  Basically, global capitalism, how much it sucks, how unequal it is, and then theories on how to critique it, and the problems with social science's methods.  lol.  So needless to say, it is a great program for me.  But my visit left only more questions and maybe even some reservations.

But, all told, I would do really well there.  They basically said that if you are proactive and assertive that you can get the things done you need to and in a timely manner.  No one has ever accused me of not standing up for and pushing for what I want.  I would do fine there, and intellectually rather well.  Better funding would probably be the trump card.  But we shall see.

Off to Boston tomorrow....

School

So this time of year I have noted at other points has become my favorite.  It is the time when I get to look at the future with hope.  Not the future in general, but mine.  It is school application season.  The time of the year that I can at least hope that this time next year I will be in a PhD program, and the time of year that I always get to engage with my own intellectual interests.  I have put in a number of applications now and still have a few more to go.  UC Santa Barbara, UConn, UC Davis, Hawaii, UC Santa Cruz, Boston College, Rutgers, Pitt, and York (Canada) are all in.  BC and York still have materials that need logisticing, but otherwise there are just a few more to go.  I've got three more spots to fill in my limit and four schools, SUNY Stony Brook and Binghamton, Vanderbilt and Northeastern.  I also have a fall back school in the University of Ljubljana should all go array.  But anyway, I'm almost there.  I'll give a full break down of the costs and finagling it took to bring that down once I've got everything in, but for now I am just about making that last decision and promoting myself at each school.

This Tuesday I just started what should be a few school visits that will help me both decide where to apply and hopefully get in.  Despite having some form of the bubonic plague I jumped in my car and headed up to Storrs, Connecticut to visit UConn and their sociology department.  What I thought was going to be a last minute, one half to maybe an hour's worth of time with a professor or two turned into a four hour red carpet tour of the program and school.  I met with pretty much every professor there on campus at that point and the grad students.  I met with two of my top three choices for supervision and was very happy with them.  One works on social movements and such with a focus on Africa and Ghana and the other has won an award for a published article about a new theoretical way of looking at social movements.  Both were really nice and I felt that I had a good intellectual engagement with them.  The graduate director as well, who works on closely related issues - mostly labor issues - was great also.

The campus itself is getting a major overhaul as they are adding building after building and new professors.  Sociology alone will get 5-6 new professors for next year and one of them would benefit me apparently.  There will probably be more as well in the coming years. While the building they are housed in could use a face lift - it is one of the oldest buildings on campus - it is a classic new England school architecture that is nice.  The school is out in the middle of no where though.  And when I say this I do not mean like Morgantown, WV out in the middle of nowhere (a town of 30,000 in the middle of nowhere), I mean, no town at all in the middle of nowhere.  Like an intersection with a couple shops in it is the whole town.  Suffice it to say, moving there from Brooklyn would be tough.  But then again, I've always dreamed of a cabin in the woods!!  hahaha!!

The program itself has received a face-lift in the last 15 or so years as well.  They have consciously made it more structured.  Not the best thing for me, as they now have two classes required in both qualitative and quantitative methods.  I would like to only have to take one quants class at most, but overall its still really good.  They have moved away from exams as well - a good thing for me - and only require one comprehensive exam to move the next levels of the program.

Anyway, as it is, it was a great visit.  I would do well there and with their staff.  The mere fact that they rolled out a little carpet for me makes me think that I am going to be well considered there.  They'd seen the NY Times videos and went out of their way.  I feel good about my chances.  I was told that they would be starting to make their list in the end of January.  They have pushed their Dec 1st deadline back to January 15th - I would assume because they didn't get enough applicants or as good of ones as they'd like.  They are also likely to be a fall back school for a lot of Ivy type candidates.  The impression I got, was that I should be patient and allow the process to take its course.  That I will be on a list, wait list at worst and that I should just let it all play itself out.  They brought in 11 people last year, which is a lot more than a place like Rutgers that had two last year.  Plus with more Sociology programs in the country there is not the squeeze that there is in Anthropology.

I feel good about the visit.  We'll see where the other schools fall.  I'd certainly like to be in more of a city, but all the same might do well with no distractions!  I am going to go to York in Canada during the first week of January and stop at Binghamton on the way back.  I'll try to sneak out to Stony Brook one day here when I have off from work.  I'd love to get to Cali and check at least Davis and Santa Cruz.  I need to sell myself to these people, bring out my strengths for them.  I'm never the strongest on paper, but in person I carry more merit.  So that's the plan, and its moving forward!