<p>I’m not sure what’s going on with the kid. I definitely don’t think 3 months is anything, because that’s the same as if you just took the summer off. While I do think at this point if he doesn’t have a plan maybe he should accept underemployment while he develops a better plan and gets connected. </p>
<p>However, the main reason why I replied to this outdated message is because, I was sort of sad to see everyone’s perception of the situation, this common agreement. Yes I understand where you’re coming from, but I remember being in a similar situation, and it hurt a lot. </p>
<p>Here’s a poem I wrote when I was a recent graduate, had applied to hundreds of jobs and hadn’t gotten more than a few phone interviews and on-site interviews… but not an offer. Ohh and background. I’m not sure where my rank was, but I was probably in the bottom half, as my engineering gpa was below the average 4.2/5.0 and I graduated after the recession. </p>
<p>I recognize that the feeling I had, the power I gave to others in making me feel this way had a lot to do with pride. I no longer have this type of pride. Hence, I no longer feel this way. I recognize, that even if I ended up working as a farm laborer for whatever reason (our company had a recent layoff) I would not let YOUR beliefs about what I should be doing dictate how I feel. I feel that I am doing a good job as long as I am working towards my goals and dreams in a sustainable manner. </p>
<p>Here’s the poem I wrote back then.</p>
<p>The Destructiveness of Their Perception
by swanlight</p>
<p>Never used to say a curse word.
Thought it was rude and useless.</p>
<p>After twelve and two years of exposure,
succumbed am I to their culture.</p>
<p>Not because I can not resist,
for a stubborn fighter I can be.
But because of the growing pressure I feel from them,
that I have become what I did not want to be.</p>
<p>They judge, yet who are they,
to know how to do it right?
They trample on the weak,
and the dreamers they attack likewise.</p>
<p>The status quo is their religion.
According to its scales they act.
A lawyer weighs more than a community organizer,
the Sanhedrin more than a carpenter.</p>
<p>An entrepreneur is permissive,
if they return the investment in years that are few.
Or the promise of return is bigger,
than any other machine can brew.</p>
<p>The investors and VC’s gamble,
few care enough about the investment’s impact.</p>
<p>Their mindset has wormed its way
through the rich and poor,
here and there,
Miami to Austin, Lima to Boston,
San Francisco to Bel-Air,
Seoul to Xinjiang,
Abu Dhabi to Calcutta,
and everywhere.</p>
<p>These thoughts make society what it is.
Few question why its there.
In turn, these companies lobby,
they lobby so that the rules,
the rules are set for them to be favored,
they block free-trade, ask for less regulation.
Don’t inspect our meat.
So what if a bit of E-coli is there?</p>
<p>Large companies don’t serve their customers,
they serve their shareholders, investors, and sometimes VC’s.</p>
<p>Currently, Honesty is second, Integrity, third,
to the power of this perception,
To the thoughts, the wants,
the desires of those,
those who expect quarterly magic
to happen to their
portfolio.</p>
<p>When it doesn’t,
its them first,
else last.</p>
<p>Sell,
that laptop without safety testing.
Fill,
that hot dog with more corn.
Put more corn filling in those
“chicken tenders.”</p>
<p>Honesty is second, Integrity, third.</p>
<p>Believed, did I.
Believed, in the basic human principles.</p>
<p>To dream beyond these years,
beyond the status quo,
beyond the current market,</p>
<p>To dream based on what engineering allows,
based on what is technically possible,</p>
<p>To dream to save lives,
with a technology modified for those who need saving,</p>
<p>To want something more,
something more than this conveyor belt of life.
To want more than my own survival,
or that of my offspring.
What does life mean if all we want is to survive?</p>
<p>To care for those
those that pull my heart strings.
It’s not their fault,
that they were born there,
that there aren’t any schools,
that their parents can’t afford to feed them,
that their parents can’t find work.
That the farms their parents owned,
passed on from generations,
was sold for a meager amount,
to a giant corporation.</p>
<p>That Monsanto patents food,
So that the world is dependent on them for productive crops,
That the Americans block free-trade,
and keeps poverty in those countries locked.</p>
<p>That Americans are encouraged to think
all they can do is pray and send monetary aid.
They think not of why
these people are in this situation in the first place.</p>
<p>They do not blame themselves,
they do not blame our system.</p>
<p>We are scared of fairness.
We say, let the free-market reign,
the best will win out the rest,
and that will be good.</p>
<p>Yet they fail to acknowledge
inherent advantage.
That the laws they made,
favor them, over true global competition.</p>
<p>I don’t know,
I don’t understand.</p>
<p>I don’t know if we could succeed or even survive
in a truly fair global competition.</p>
<p>Understanding the world a bit better
I don’t think these people will
ever give up
their advantage, their laws, their trade.
Their self-interest, is first.
Should our mindset be as such?
Yet by doing so, we are harming others.
If we allowed a truly fair trade,
would we survive?</p>
<p>Honesty is second, Integrity, third
to that profit that does not last.
For, what is today has no guarantee
of existing beyond the now.</p>
<p>Salt was as valuable as an Ipod.
It preserved the food and added taste.
Now, it is about a dollar a pound.</p>
<p>Flight was thought impossible,
the Wright brothers showed them wrong.</p>
<p>Edison was accepted,
Tesla was rejected.
Yet we know
from whom our AC came from.</p>
<p>To pursue that “impossible dream,
no matter how hopeless,
no matter how far.”</p>
<p>I thought I was ready,
ready to launch,
an MIT degree in engineering,
a head brimming of possible technologies.</p>
<p>I chose not to follow
the ready-set entry level jobs.
I thought I was too inventive,
to sign away my rights at large.</p>
<p>Yet, even when I try to compromise,
where I think I can,
and I send my information to these places who judge me for what I am.
I am stuck. They judge.
They weigh my competition more than me.</p>
<p>My competition remembered that alpha is diffusivity
in units of meters per second square.
I had to look it up again, and that was two minutes
of a fifty-five minute exam.</p>
<p>A differential equation,
I messed up in solving.
Copy, I did not, in that transport class.
Even though most did not hold up honesty to the degree that I had,
so I turned in the work that I did not have.</p>
<p>By who knows what reasons, I scored slightly higher in some exams,
than some of those who copied,
yet in the end, it didn’t matter
because what I didn’t do ate up my final score.</p>
<p>I believed.
I believed that in the end,
I wanted to have the right tools.
That this was all that mattered,
because of what I could do.</p>
<p>I trusted my guts as to where I didn’t fit in.
And I have been searching for a job,
to please those who fed me.
To please, mother and father,
neighbor and friend.
To keep being the role-model
the community made me.
To keep my head high, with my engineering degree,
To work office hours instead of 9pm to 3.</p>
<p>To sit in an office,
instead of the sun,
To drive a mercedes-benz,
instead of a junk car.
To tip well at restaurants,
instead of being the waiter.
To be invited to Christmas parties,
with an expensive caterer.
To go to Alumni reunions
and show off my shinier-than-thou brass rat.
To donate money to a school
so my name on that building lasts.</p>
<p>My pride is gone.
I am broken.
My name is synonymous to forgotten.
I feel that pain,
that pain that he felt,
when they said
“He could save others, but he can’t save himself.”</p>
<p>Except I don’t know if I could save others,
I just know I tried.
The one thing I didn’t do
was look out for my own interest.</p>
<p>Or maybe I did,
I did too much,
I don’t know.</p>
<p>I know I was picky,
and refused to work the grave yard shift,
even in an engineering role.
I thought Arizona was too much of a compromise,
far,
far from anyone I know.</p>
<p>I thought Texas would lynch me
for my liberal and progressive views.
I thought I would be unhappy
if I gave in to these few,
these few choices that I had
like others before graduation.</p>
<p>I thought I deserved better,
and looked for other locations.</p>
<p>And now I have been stuck,
in a limbo for several months.
Isolated, have I been
from many whom I care about.</p>
<p>I fear their judgement,
For they judge like others do.
They look at my bank account, resume, gpa,
and weigh me on a scale.</p>
<p>To them,
potential means little, ideas are cheap,
enthusiasm is ephemeral and one must look out for their own teeth.</p>
<p>Parents, their role is so strong,
when they kick their offspring,
they do a terrible wrong.
Especially offspring like me,
who need special support,
they make us feel worthless,
worth less than the dog they own.</p>
<p>Salary is all they care about,
money now is worth more than money later.</p>
<p>They want return on their investment,
they gave thousands and expect all of it back
add interest too, you ungrateful mouth.</p>
<p>Your dreams are worthless,
suck up your pain.
I worked the graveyard shift why can’t you?
Your highness, clean up your room.
Wash the dishes, cook for me,
you’re sleeping here,
I have the right to scream.
I can yell, I can walk in on you,
and if I feel like it, I will hit you.</p>
<p>There’s no support,
even though I thought I had it.
Don’t know where to go,
Don’t know what to do,
I have a job application record of 152.</p>
<p>I have begun to understand those who commit suicide.
But, this external pressure will not win,
I will survive.
I will survive, and more than that, I will thrive,
because I know of things that are greater than them,
because I know that things don’t last.
The world turns, people change, demand changes, the market changes,
and one day I will laugh.</p>
<p>Yet, this pain, I thought I’d never go through.
Feeling so rejected,
152, plus father and old friends,
who knows who else.
I could have picked an easier path.
Foolish? I ask myself.</p>
<p>A friend’s mom recounts how she slept in a car,
she tells me to take any job,
she says take it even if it pays 10 dollars an hour.
One summer, I worked for 2.5 times that amount,
I was just an intern without a degree,
and now I have devalued myself.</p>
<p>I can feel their laughter,
it haunts me,
how old friends make fun of me.</p>
<p>How others, who didn’t share my rank,
right now, make tons more than me.</p>
<p>They say the mighty have fallen,
others say the weak have shown themselves.</p>
<p>Some neighbors pity me,
they whisper amongst themselves.
Once they pushed their children through my door,
for counseling, SAT prep and so much more.</p>
<p>Now they take their children back,
and hide them from my steps.</p>
<p>I am broken, my pride is gone.
Some say, just do something, anything, to fill in your resume.
As if, my job is to please this mighty employer-god.
I don’t believe in that god.
But I am not in power, and they choose what others do.</p>
<p>Maybe others like to be told what to do,
as long as they get a good paycheck.
Maybe that’s all they care about.
Why am I so unreasonable?
Why can’t I follow my own dreams? My own ideas?
Why can’t I get funding for what I want to pursue,
what if you don’t get a return? You’ve gambled too.
I hate this game, and wish I could change the rules.</p>
<p>Don’t judge me, because you will be judged too.</p>
<p>I believe in the apocolypse,
in the day of judgement.
I believe in the end,
their wealth will mean nothing.</p>
<p>Our society doesn’t value morals
as much as it values wealth.</p>
<p>I was just hoping that some of my dreaming
may come true before the end comes.</p>
<p>I know the poor will always be with us,
for it was said “they will always be among you.”
Yet it was our charge to care for them like ourselves,
no matter how hopeless,
how unreasonable, and contradictorily impossible.</p>
<p>I approach this problem,
knowing I cannot solve it.
Knowing that I am not meant to solve it,
Knowing that no one is.</p>
<p>Yet, I know that we are supposed to attempt,
attempt to do so.
That this is our trial,
that this is our quest,
to attempt what we know is impossible,
because of what we were commanded,
and because
we know it feels right.</p>
<p>You can not quantify the monetary value
of that smile and hug you received
from that starving girl who has no family.</p>
<p>You can not quantify
the pleasure and taste of that food,
that was prepared for you in love,
from a family’s storage of food,
they who “have nothing.”</p>
<p>Our society does not put monetary value
to these things,
and yet even Scrooge learns to value them.</p>
<p>Fulfillment is a balance.
A balance of duty and pleasure.</p>
<p>Pleasure alone does not fill,
Nor duty alone satisfy.</p>
<p>When both are in place,
Happiness comes to visit.
Joy and smiles spread like disease.</p>
<p>Yet, we all know the ephemeral nature of these.
And we know that we can’t completely rid poverty, injustice, and famine.
But trying is what we’re supposed to do.
And, in the end, all I want,
is to hear,
from Him,
“I am pleased.”</p>
Glad things are looking up, it’s valuable to have perspective.</p>