Refugees

For a while, I was running around by myself, doing errands that can only be depicted in a techno montage: making phone calls, getting a haircut at the mall for future interviews, planting a bug in the lobby of a hotel, finding my resume, blending in with the crowd while doing reconnaissance for certain commercial locations, making a few transactions at the bank, and getting in a kung fu duel on the roof of the parking garage.

It turns out that Dean is in the same sinking boat. He was let go at almost the exact same time as me. So we arranged to meet and commiserate.

Friday I found myself right back where I started fourteen months ago. I was sitting at Scooter’s, drinking coffee, browsing Career Builder, listening to iTunes, going numb. Then Dean showed up.

For a while, we were planning and hypothesizing together, but eventually we got burned out on that. When I went for my third cup of coffee, he pulled out his Nintendo DS and another one for me. We played some 2-player Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass, pissing off those around us.

Then we got hungry and decided to check out some place we’d never been for happy hour. After a burger, we moseyed around in the cold for a while, still clueless to our futures. Then we ended up going ahead with Plan A, which involved Margaritas at Baja 600 just like last Friday, only we consumed a lot less. We didn’t throw all caution to the wind.

It was our last meal, so to speak. Neither of us is interested in getting jobs similar to what we were just dumped from, but neither of us has any ideas what to do instead. Embracing the turbulence of the unknown, I made an ironic toast, “It’s an exciting time to be alive.”