by Karyn Bosnak
I also sent it to every news station from CNN and MSNBC to FOX News Channel and Court TV. And after that, to the folks at CBS, NBC, ABC, and FOX. And eventually, to the people at MTV and VH1. And again nada. Nothing. Zilch.
And even though it’s a completely different type of producing, I sent it to all the primetime series from Law & Order and Ed to Sex and the City and The Sopranos. And every soap opera from As the World Turns and Guiding Light to One Life to Live and All My Children. I even told them I’d be interested in an entry-level position. An entry-level position, for goodness sake. And nothing.
Before too long I moved on to those websites like HotJobs.com and Monster.com. And between you and me, I think those things are a big sham because I never got one phone call back. And I didn’t just apply for television jobs—I applied for everything. From marketing and PR jobs to magazine and publishing jobs—they all got my resume. And still nothing. I even sent my resume in for jobs with positions that I didn’t even understand. One was for an “Act. Mgr./Bus. Dev.” What the heck is that? Could they be more vague? But I sent them my resume and told them that I’d make a swell “Act. Mgr./Bus. Dev.” And still, no one called me back. A couple weeks had gone by and I still hadn’t gotten anywhere. But every day I played it…
Oh, yes, I am wise!
Motivate, Helen. Motivate.
If I had to, I can do la ta da!
I am strong! STRONG
I am incredible…
Oops. I mean…
I am invincible!
I AM WOOOMAN!
A jobless woman—but I was a woman. By the end of January I had bookmarked fifty-four job search sites on Claire the computer. Fifty-fucking-four. And I visited them all every single day. How could this have happened to me? Since when did I become a bad hire? After a while I started to get a few courtesy letters in the mail. I don’t know why people called them that, because everyone knows they are really “we will never call you ever” letters.
* * *
TeleVest
January 28, 2002
Karyn Bosnak
123 Broke St.
Brooklyn, NY 11201
Dear Karyn:
Your resume has come to my attention. Unfortunately, we do not have a position available at this time for someone with your credentials. I will be pleased to keep your resume in our active file in the event that a suitable opportunity presents itself in the near future.
In the meantime, I thank you for your interest in Procter & Gamble Productions and wish you success in your future endeavors.
Sincerely,
Stephanie Marsh
Manager, Human Resources and Administration
Daytime Programs
As the World Turns and Guiding Light
* * *
I received so many of those that I wanted to start writing back to each person. I wonder what they would do if I did….
* * *
FROM MY LIVING ROOM IN BROOKLYN…
January 28, 2002
Stephanie Marsh
Manager, Human Resources and Administration
Daytime Programs
As the World Turns and Guiding Light
Dear Steph,
First of all, I didn’t send you my resume, I sent it to your boss. So please thank his lazy ass for me for passing on his dirty work to you. And second of all, what do you mean there’s nothing open for someone “with my credentials”?
Sure I’ve never worked at a “fancy” soap opera before, Steph, but how hard can it be to fluff hair all day and make sure that Billie Joe doesn’t look fat in her outfit? I’m a jack-of-all-trades. I’m telling you, I could do the job. Working in daytime television, I made miracles happen every single day, Steph. I got a guest some teeth an hour before showtime, Steph. I gave the clothes off my back to some sorry sap who showed up in an Alf T-shirt, Steph. I CAN DO ANYTHING! DON’T YOU UNDERSTAND?
Obviously not. So go ahead and keep my resume in your “active” file. I won’t wait by the phone for your call. And by the way, I didn’t know that your company was owned by Procter & Gamble. But now that I do, I just want to let you know that Secret deodorant sucks.
Sincerely,
Karyn Bosnak
PS—I’m a big fan of Downy though.
* * *
And can you believe that in the middle of all the letters, I got a “courtesy” postcard? How cheap can you seriously be? A postcard? You can’t fork over the extra sixteen cents for a letter stamp?
* * *
Dear Sir/Madam:
Thank you for your interest in a position with Court TV. We have reviewed your resume and find that while your experience is impressive, it does not match our current needs. However, we will keep your resume on file. We will contact you should an appropriate position open in the future. We wish you success in your job search.
Sincerely,
Veronica Lange
Vice President, Human Resources
* * *
At least good ole Stephanie had the decency to personalize and sign her letter. But Veronica, on top of the “Dear Sir/Madam” part, Veronica’s signature was even stamped. Not even stamped actually. It was just run through the printer like the rest of the postcard. I wanted to drop good ole Veronica a note too…
* * *
FROM MY LIVING ROOM IN BROOKLYN…
January 29, 2002
Dear Veronica,
Thanks for the cheap-ass postcard, now the whole world knows I’m an unemployed hack. Yep. Everyone down at the Cadman Plaza Post Office in Brooklyn is laughing their ass off because my sorry ass doesn’t have a job and they do.
I was wondering, I noticed that your pre-printed and signed postcard says “while your experience is impressive.” Do you have an alternate version that says “while your experience sucks”? Just wondering.
I doubt I’ll hear from you, seeing as you didn’t even have time to sign your postcard, but if you have time, please drop me a note. Or a postcard. Or whatever.
Sincerely,
Karyn Bosnak
* * *
But I have to admit that both the letter and the postcard beat the e-mail response. The e-mail response was truly the worst. It was the “We are too cheap to send even a postcard” response. It made poor Veronica look like a Rockefeller.
DATE: January 31, 2002
TO: Karyn Bosnak
FROM: Pop Sustainability
RE: Resume
Dear Ms. Bosnak:
We regret to inform you that we have recently filled the position for which you applied. However we’d like to invite you to an open house that we are having, as we’d love to hear your ideas on ways that we can bring our company into the next millennium…
After reading that I wanted so badly to hit the Reply button….
DATE: January 31, 2002
TO: Pop Sustainability
FROM: Karyn Bosnak
RE: Re: Resume
To Whom it May Concern:
Let me get this right…. You aren’t going to hire me, but you want me to come to an open house and give you all my ideas for free? Is that it? Do I have that correct?
Here’s an idea…fuck off! Yep! You and your company can go fuck yourselves all the way into the next millennium!
You’re gonna have to pay me,
Karyn Bosnak
Yep. By the end of the month I had gone mad. I had gotten mad. I was angry—partly with myself because I felt responsible for my situation, and partly with everyone else for not wanting to hire me. And after I was done being mad, or angry, or whatever I was, I became sad. I felt like a loser.
I got up from the kitchen table and walked into my bathroom and looked at myself in the mirror. My hair had two months of roots exposed. My brows were overgrown. I was a hot mess. And I was fat. I’d gained almost ten pounds while working at Ananda, and since I’d left I gained another five. My “fat jeans” didn’t even fit anymore. For Christmas my mom gave me a gym membership to the New York Sports Club in Brooklyn and
I hadn’t gone once since I’d joined.
Just then I felt sick to my stomach when I thought of the $3,600 that I spent in personal training fees at Crunch. And that was on top of the $75 a month that I paid in dues. And for what? I was a fat pig now. Fatter than when I started.
And I could barely fit into any of the clothes that were hanging in my closet. And I didn’t even want to think about what I’d look like in the lingerie and nighties that I’d bought. I wanted to think about them less after I remembered that I hadn’t had a bikini wax in months. What was all that really for? It didn’t get me anywhere. Except jobless, single, and fat in an apartment in Brooklyn.
JUST A THOUGHT…
Later that afternoon, I decided that I needed to go to the gym. Yep. I needed exercise. Every day as I was looking for a job, I loaded up on sandwiches from the deli. Like my doormen, I had grown to know and like the guys at the corner store. Their names were Sam and D. Sam owned the joint and D made the sandwiches. And D made some mean sandwiches! They were good, and I seemed to put on a few pounds from scarfing them down every day. I was sure that I’d feel better if I got in shape. So I squeezed into my gym clothes, grabbed my Walkman, and headed out the door.
As I was walking to the gym minding my own business, three neighborhood hoodlum boys came up behind me and started to push me. By the looks of them, I’d guess they were thirteen or fourteen years old. I was on a busy street, and there were a lot of people around, so I just guessed they were being silly, and didn’t get too terrified.
“Hey, lady,” they said, laughing.
“Hey what?” I said back to them, trying to sound friendly. By now, two of them had gotten on either side of me and started to push me to the left and then pull me to the right, and then back and forth and back and forth again like I was a wishbone. They kept doing it and they kept laughing. They thought it was funny.
“Hey, lady, where’s the train?” they asked. Now, I knew these boys knew where the train was. And I realized that they were just trying to harass me. But obviously I couldn’t help but get a little freaked out.
“It’s over there,” I said, pointing in the direction of the subway.
Just then the third boy came up behind me and started to hit me over the head with a plastic soda bottle. Yes he did! A plastic soda bottle! It might have been plastic, but it still hurt and it still freaked me out even more.
“Hey, lady,” they kept saying. I tried to pull away, but the two of them each had a firm grip on both of my arms, so I didn’t have much luck. And the third one kept whacking me on the head!
Just then, a man was approaching us and looked at me, realizing that I was uncomfortable. When he stopped in front of us, they let go of me and started harassing him. They pulled his glasses off his face and threw them into the street. And then did the same with his briefcase. And all the while they laughed. They thought it was so funny to harass people. A few seconds later, a police car pulled up and they ran away. At which point the police left too.
I thanked the man for stopping and helped him gather his things. I know what happened wasn’t horrible, but all I wanted to do was work out! And I got harassed by the hoodlum boys in the neighborhood! So I cried. Yep, me the eternal crier. I wasn’t hurt, but once again I just felt like a loser. So I turned around and went home, put on my pajamas and crawled in bed. It was the middle of the afternoon.
The next thing I knew Scott was standing over me shaking me.
“Karyn, get up,” he said. I was still lying in bed.
“No,” I said, pulling the covers up over my head.
“Yes,” he said, pulling them back down.
“Why?” I asked
“Because it’s two o’clock in the afternoon on Saturday and you’ve been sleeping for almost an entire day now. You need to get up.”
“I don’t want to,” I said.
“Why not?” he asked.
“Because no one likes me,” I said.
“Like who?” he asked.
“Like everyone I sent my resume to. Even the neighborhood hoodlum boys hate me,” I said.
“Huh?” he asked. I told him what had happened. He tried not to, but he laughed.
“Okay, I know it’s not funny, but the plastic soda bottle part is kind of comical,” he said. I didn’t laugh. “Okay, maybe not. But you still need to get up.”
“I don’t want to. Look at me,” I said, pointing to my roots and my eyebrows. “And I don’t even want to show you what’s going on down there.” I motioned under the covers.
“Thanks for sparing me,” he said.
“I need a job so badly. I don’t have any money,” I said. Scott was the only person that I’d told about my debt. I had to because of the whole apartment credit check thing. He was really supportive and nice about it though.
“Veda doesn’t have money either,” he said, pointing to his delirious dog, who was standing on my bed next to where I was sleeping, staring at me square in the eye with her tongue hanging out of her mouth. I let out a bit of a laugh.
“She doesn’t have any money,” he continued, seeing that I was amused. “Not one penny, not a dime to her name.” I looked at Veda, who was panting deliriously with her eyes crossed again.
“Yeah,” I said back, “she doesn’t have any money though because she doesn’t have any pockets to put it in.” Just like I liked to give Elvis human characteristics, Scott liked to give them to Veda too.
“You could always just hang up a sign,” he said.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“A sign. I was just at the grocery store and I saw a sign hanging up on the bulletin board that said, ‘I need seven thousand dollars. If you can help me, let me know. I just need seven grand.’ And at the bottom there were a bunch of those tear-off things with a phone number on it.”
“That’s not a bad idea,” I said. I pictured myself hanging up a sign at the local Brooklyn grocery store. “I need $20,000!” Yeah, right. That couldn’t possibly work. No one would just give me $20,000.
“It’s a thought,” he said. Yes, it was. Just a thought.
A few minutes later, I pulled myself out of bed and took a shower. I needed to get a job because I needed to pay off my debt, because no one was just going to give me $20,000. And with that, the thought was already out of my head.
TWELVE
GRAND DEBT TALLY $21,741.00
26: PROFESSIONAL GAMBLING
By the beginning of February, I had really hit rock bottom. I still was unable to find a job and pretty much just felt like giving up. Early in the month, my dad came to visit me for about a week. When he asked me how I had been surviving for two months without working, I told him that I had savings. I didn’t want him to worry so I didn’t tell him that I was nearly flat broke. I paid for my February rent, but by the looks of my checkbook I wouldn’t have enough to get through March. I needed money badly.
During his visit, he wanted to go to Atlantic City for a day, so the two of us took a bus there from Penn Station early one morning. I didn’t feel that well and had a bit of a cough, so I took some cough syrup before we left. Then I followed it with a cup of coffee. Then I got on a hot bus. Then I barfed.
Yep, I’ve always tended to get carsick, even without the cough syrup and coffee. But let me tell you that the three of them mixed together is just a recipe for disaster. Thankfully, I made it to the bathroom on the bus before I let loose. Bus bathrooms are kind of like Porta Pottis. They don’t flush. And they stink. And as I leaned over and watched whatever the liquid was that was in the bottom of the toilet slosh around, I once again wondered how I’d ended up such a loser.
After a couple of hours, the bus finally arrived in Atlantic City, and as I got off and looked at my pants in the sunlight, I realized that I had missed the toilet a few times. Little specks of throw-up seemed to be sprinkled all over the bottom of my pants—my black stretchy pants because my butt wouldn’t fit into my jeans anymore. But I just wiped it off. I was in Atlantic City, after all
—not exactly the runway of a fashion show.
The night before we left, I’d had a dream about the number 26, so I decided to only play games that involved that number. Aside from the $10 free token that they gave me on the bus, I had twenty bucks in my pocket—and that was all I planned on spending. After looking around for a while, I found a fifty-cent slot machine that had a total of $2,600 in its jackpot. Perfect! With my dad taking the machine next to me, I sat down and put my $10 inside. I pulled the lever and spin, spin, spin—nothing. I pulled it again and spin, spin, spin—nothing. I pulled it again, and spin, spin, spin—ding ding ding! Lights started flashing and I didn’t know what had happened.
“What happened?” I asked my dad.
“Honey, you won!” he said.
“I did?” I asked. Really!?
“Yeah!” he answered, checking out the machine. I was so excited! I’d just won $2,600!
“Oh, wait,” he said. “You didn’t bet the maximum though.”
“What does that mean?” I asked.