Ugh. I just got fired from my job at Hallmark. Ok, let me explain.
My friend Rose was tired of me never making any time for her or her family, but with school and working full time at the flower shop, who had the time? So, she hooked me up with a seasonal part time evening job at Hallmark, which actually coincided with my plan to save up so I could visit Europe next summer. It was all going fine. Or at least, I thought it was. I was the first person in over seven years to correctly find all the cards in my training test and I sold six Precious Moments figurines to a customer on my first day. I thought I was doing pretty damn good.
But then on Sunday, my training manager called me to the back room and told me she had been observing me.
CORALEE: David…I’ve been watching you…and…I don’t think it’s going to work out between you and Hallmark.
ME: What do you mean?
CORALEE: You don’t seem that motivated. It’s like you don’t want to be here.
ME: Uh…no. I do want to be here. I like it here. It’s…
CORALEE: You’re heart doesn’t seem in it. You don’t approach the customers or talk to them…
ME: Are you kidding me? I’m always talking to customers. That’s how I sell them stuff.
CORALEE: You just don’t seem passionate about working here…
ME: Seriously? It’s selling cards. You really cant get too passionate about selling cards. I’m sorry I don’t have an orgasm every time I make a sale, but I think I do pretty good.
CORALEE: Mm-hmm. Well, it's not just me...Wendy the manager, has also observed you and she feels the same way. She says you have an attitude problem, something I really don’t agree with, but…
ME: But I’ve never worked with Wendy! How can she say that? I don’t have an attitude problem. I come in and do my work and I always make sure I have a smile on my face. I never complain that I always get stuck with the vacuum duties, I always offer to take out the trash…and I’m the best damn gift wrapper you have!
CORALEE: Well, there was that incident last week when a girl came in and asked us if she was interrupting you and I. She was David. I was in the middle of training you and you just completely ignore me to help her. That hurt.
ME: But she was a customer! I thought we were supposed to treat our customers as if they were guests in our home!
CORALEE: Yeah…I’m sorry David. We’ve just decided you and Hallmark are not going to work out. You’re a nice, sweet, young man and you’re a hard worker, but…I’m sorry.
And then she gave me a hug. A total Judas Iscariot hug. I knew my performance at Hallmark was impeccable, no matter what Coralee said. Maybe I was being let go because I was the only guy working there. I mean, it made sense. There were employees there who used their cell phones to text while out on the floor and some of them didn’t even know the location of certain cards, but yet I was the one being let go? I wanted to knock the Precious Moments out of Coralee and say, “How’s that for an attitude adjustment?” but I knew I had to show restraint. After all, I had shown restraint earlier last week.
There’s a networking business organization my boss Alice works with and when she found out they needed someone to write their monthly online newsletter, she recommended me. At first, I really liked doing it. I really liked attending the meetings and having total control of writing a newsletter. But then it got straining. And then it got draining. William, the founder of the networking business organization turned out to be a neurotic man who never slept and had a severe obsessive compulsive disorder. He would call at 11 or 12 at night, asking me to add an article in the newsletter or to ask me if I had noticed the changes he made. It got to the point where he would get upset with me if the newsletter wasn’t done within a week. I knew I had to quit. Our personalities just clashed and I just couldn’t put up with his neurosis any longer.
I was in the middle of writing my resignation letter ,with the help of Alice, when my phone rang. It was Aleah, a former sales director at a local radio station and a member of the networking business organization, who had called to tell me, my services were no longer needed for the online newsletter. William, told Aleah to tell me the networking business organization was “going in a different way.” They wanted an actual member to be in charge of the newsletter to “devote more time” to it. Ugh. “Devote more time,” my ass. I devoted plenty of time to it and I even put up with William’s insanity for five months! I couldn’t believe I was fired, before I could quit. So unfair.
But as luck would have it, there was a silver lining on a window that was just opening up. Aleah had recently left her position at the radio to work for 520 Living, a new lifestyle magazine that was launching early next year and she asked me if I would be interested in writing reviews for the magazine about all the trendy hotspots around town! I would be getting paid to have fun! I, of course, had to submit a sample review of the last nightclub I attended, but as of this morning...I have the job!
And as Coralee waved goodbye to me, I knew there was a silver lining somewhere in all of this. I just wish I knew where.
My friend Rose was tired of me never making any time for her or her family, but with school and working full time at the flower shop, who had the time? So, she hooked me up with a seasonal part time evening job at Hallmark, which actually coincided with my plan to save up so I could visit Europe next summer. It was all going fine. Or at least, I thought it was. I was the first person in over seven years to correctly find all the cards in my training test and I sold six Precious Moments figurines to a customer on my first day. I thought I was doing pretty damn good.
But then on Sunday, my training manager called me to the back room and told me she had been observing me.
CORALEE: David…I’ve been watching you…and…I don’t think it’s going to work out between you and Hallmark.
ME: What do you mean?
CORALEE: You don’t seem that motivated. It’s like you don’t want to be here.
ME: Uh…no. I do want to be here. I like it here. It’s…
CORALEE: You’re heart doesn’t seem in it. You don’t approach the customers or talk to them…
ME: Are you kidding me? I’m always talking to customers. That’s how I sell them stuff.
CORALEE: You just don’t seem passionate about working here…
ME: Seriously? It’s selling cards. You really cant get too passionate about selling cards. I’m sorry I don’t have an orgasm every time I make a sale, but I think I do pretty good.
CORALEE: Mm-hmm. Well, it's not just me...Wendy the manager, has also observed you and she feels the same way. She says you have an attitude problem, something I really don’t agree with, but…
ME: But I’ve never worked with Wendy! How can she say that? I don’t have an attitude problem. I come in and do my work and I always make sure I have a smile on my face. I never complain that I always get stuck with the vacuum duties, I always offer to take out the trash…and I’m the best damn gift wrapper you have!
CORALEE: Well, there was that incident last week when a girl came in and asked us if she was interrupting you and I. She was David. I was in the middle of training you and you just completely ignore me to help her. That hurt.
ME: But she was a customer! I thought we were supposed to treat our customers as if they were guests in our home!
CORALEE: Yeah…I’m sorry David. We’ve just decided you and Hallmark are not going to work out. You’re a nice, sweet, young man and you’re a hard worker, but…I’m sorry.
And then she gave me a hug. A total Judas Iscariot hug. I knew my performance at Hallmark was impeccable, no matter what Coralee said. Maybe I was being let go because I was the only guy working there. I mean, it made sense. There were employees there who used their cell phones to text while out on the floor and some of them didn’t even know the location of certain cards, but yet I was the one being let go? I wanted to knock the Precious Moments out of Coralee and say, “How’s that for an attitude adjustment?” but I knew I had to show restraint. After all, I had shown restraint earlier last week.
There’s a networking business organization my boss Alice works with and when she found out they needed someone to write their monthly online newsletter, she recommended me. At first, I really liked doing it. I really liked attending the meetings and having total control of writing a newsletter. But then it got straining. And then it got draining. William, the founder of the networking business organization turned out to be a neurotic man who never slept and had a severe obsessive compulsive disorder. He would call at 11 or 12 at night, asking me to add an article in the newsletter or to ask me if I had noticed the changes he made. It got to the point where he would get upset with me if the newsletter wasn’t done within a week. I knew I had to quit. Our personalities just clashed and I just couldn’t put up with his neurosis any longer.
I was in the middle of writing my resignation letter ,with the help of Alice, when my phone rang. It was Aleah, a former sales director at a local radio station and a member of the networking business organization, who had called to tell me, my services were no longer needed for the online newsletter. William, told Aleah to tell me the networking business organization was “going in a different way.” They wanted an actual member to be in charge of the newsletter to “devote more time” to it. Ugh. “Devote more time,” my ass. I devoted plenty of time to it and I even put up with William’s insanity for five months! I couldn’t believe I was fired, before I could quit. So unfair.
But as luck would have it, there was a silver lining on a window that was just opening up. Aleah had recently left her position at the radio to work for 520 Living, a new lifestyle magazine that was launching early next year and she asked me if I would be interested in writing reviews for the magazine about all the trendy hotspots around town! I would be getting paid to have fun! I, of course, had to submit a sample review of the last nightclub I attended, but as of this morning...I have the job!
And as Coralee waved goodbye to me, I knew there was a silver lining somewhere in all of this. I just wish I knew where.
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