A Generalized Fuck You to the Bitches at the Christmas Party

Last night was the office's company Christmas party.

"Oh look!" said a young woman standing near me at a cafe table that we had all gathered around. She brushed her ironed blonde hair carefully back, "There's Paul the temp! He looks lonely."

Indeed he did. Across the room, standing just to one side of the giant doors that led into the lofty GAR Memorial Hall, was Paul the temp, nervously looking around as if desperate to find a familiar face in the crowd. As a temp myself, I identified. Last year at this time, I was told that my temporary assignment would only last until the end of the year, so I refrained from making the acquaintance of people outside of my direct sphere of influence. "The end of the year" changed to "through January," then "at least until the end of March," and before I knew it, it was December and I was standing at a cafe table with a glass of Cabernet in my hand, introducing myself to people I had worked with for an entire year.

"I feel bad for Paul," said another woman to my right, "I mean, he doesn't even have a cubicle." A brunette girl that I recognized from a time that we rode the same train in to work and walked down the same sidewalk to our building together without speaking piped in with her observations, "But did you see how he arranged the boxes in his corner to look like a cubicle? And he even has a box with a picture of a computer monitor on it set up like it was a REAL computer!" The cafe table erupted into cackles.

"I don't like him," said a girl to my left, "he listens to his headphones so damn loud I had to tell him to turn it down. His HEADPHONES! And when he has to use that rubber stamp, he just BANGS it down! I mean, when I'm on a project and working, I can't be DISTRACTED by that. He's weird." I noticed she had bad skin.

"I just feel so BAD for him," said the woman on my right again. "Don't," said the girl who couldn't be distracted, and I noticed then that she had overprocessed hair.

"I saw him in his little corner, sitting on the floor eating McDonald's one morning!" said the brunette who had yet to make eye contact with me, even there at the party.

"I told you, he's weird." Someone should get her a deep conditioner and dermabrasion.

"I still feel bad," repeated the woman to my right. Apparently, she didn't want to be left out of the fun because she changed conversation tactics then by saying "I saw him line up his coffee cups in a U-shape and just LEAVE them there! The U gets bigger as the day goes on."

At that point, I excused myself to go get another glass of wine. Paul had left his post by the door and was lost in the crowd. "There but for the grace of God go I," I thought, and rejoined the group at the cafe table.

"And then he told her how to make copies!" The woman who had been on my right was starting to get up to speed on the Paul talk, "I mean, shut up! You're just a TEMP!"

Apparently, I must have given her a look because she looked abashed and stammered out, "You're different, Amy. I didn't mean you." Blotchy VonSplitends laughed.

I may not line up my coffee cups and I do happen to have a cubicle of my own, but at the very basic level, yeah I am just like him.

I work for a company that sends its employees into multitudes of other companies to do the work that they can't or won't do themselves. We don't have health insurance provided for us and, if we want it, we have an average out-of-pocket expense of $200 for basic coverage with a high deductible and no prescription coverage. We have no dental plan, no maternity leave, no sick days and we don't get paid for holidays unless we've worked 35 hours or more for 23 weeks in a row. It's virtually impossible for a temporary employee to work that consistantly for that long, except in cases like mine.

I am a temp because I left a stable job in New York to come to Chicago and work for a company that promised me that I would be able to do the work I love for a comfortable salary. Within moments of my arrival at said job, it was apparent that the boss who had promised be independence and autonomy was a raging lunatic with a Christ complex who was inordinately fond of verbally abusing his wife in front of his employees. So, I had to leave. I am a temp because I had the audacity to believe that I would FINALLY be allowed to do the work I love for a living wage. How stupid of me! Defeated, broken and rejected by several retail establishments, I turned to my old standby, the temp agency.

And what of Paul? Is he fresh out of college and directionless? Did he take a job with the temp agency because he had no other place to go? Were his bills piling up? Is his family dependent on him? Was he a victim of the punishing economy?

If Paul looks THAT lonely in a crowd of strangers, imagine how his loneliness echoes when he is alone with his thoughts. Imagine what it must be like to not belong at the place where you spend the majority of your day. Imagine how it must be to have no one speak to you except to ask you to copy something or to tell you to turn your music down or to stop stamping papers so loudly.

Imagine working some place where no one knew your name for a year.

I am ashamed that I didn't speak up. I am sad that I work with such people. I am going to buy Paul a Christmas present. And I'm going to buy that raving bitch with cheap highlights some goddamn Clearasil.

Fucking hyenas.