Another day, another tale of frustration with the state Employment Security Department. Yesterday an unemployed construction worker dared me to call the state’s unemployment hotline and get a real human. I called, and I couldn’t. Today Schuyler Bagwell, an unemployed former city worker who has already tried the game of using the media to get the unemployment department’s attention—well, he tries again. Schuyler used to work for Seattle Community Court, trying to help homeless, drug-addicted, and chronically incarcerated people, and was laid off in October.
Instead of immediately looking for another job, I retreated to California where I smoked lots of pot in my old bedroom at my grandmother’s house and lived off of my savings account until Christmas. I casually looked for work in November, called in a few favors, but no dice. December was when I called in the troops for an all-out assault on the job market. I would send at least three resumes every working day. Christmas was less than lucrative and I still had to drive back up north. Craigslist was full of nonsensical postings that require an M.A. and five years experience for $28k per year. Monster and CareerBuilder were no better, but I carried on, despite my discouragement.
The new year happened and still no interviews. It had been two years since I’d made a latte or waited a table, but I escalated my resume distribution and went after cafes and restaurants. Nothing. Nobody would even interview me. I tried to apply for unemployment but, as you’ve heard, it’s like Russian roulette trying to talk to a human being over there. I applied for food stamps. I sold my mountain bike, a microwave, and a dead MacBook for some extra cash on craigslist. I wrote depressing fiction and sent it to some small magazines, dreaming some agent would discover me and offer me a six-figure book deal. I applied for some sketchy clinical trials at some place in Tacoma. I reached a point where I was spending more time calling unemployment’s 800 number than sending out resumes. While repetitively dialing, I wrote an email to the dailies and the TV stations, hoping some foul media exposure would help me get through. It worked. I had both Rep. Jamie Pedersen and Sen. Ed Murray apologizing profusely to me on the phone the morning after my story aired. ESD told me to fax them some pay stubs and they’d get back to me with their decision. That was three weeks ago. I haven’t seen a dime.
My former colleagues downtown wish me plenty of luck and have given me great references, but luck doesn’t pay the rent. My contract position was Community Court’s first victim of the Financiapacalypse, but annoyingly, they’ll always be hiring new cops and jail guards. I had a few good interviews in January but my half-finished college degree and relative lack of experience usually mean I end up at the bottom of the stack. I’m doing my best to fend off agonizing despair and outstanding debt, but time is seriously running out. Out of necessity, I spend hours writing a nauseatingly pandering resume only to get a postcard in the mail two weeks later that begins, “Dear Applicant,”.
I want to believe that I’m creative and self-sustainable and enjoying the freedom to smoke a bowl and watch Judge Judy, but I’m not. I’m miserable, and I would do just about anything for the financial security of a steady paycheck, which is what I imagine my former clients feel like every day of their lives.
Got a story to share? Write to jobless@thestranger.com.
Dude, you’re Seattles’ most famous pothead today, congratulations. No doubt social service agencies dealing with addicts will think you’re an ideal candidate! I mean how high can their standards be?
I would like to hear some more stories that don’t involve an unemployed person smoking pot.
last time i checked weed wasnt free, although yes it does grow on trees.
and i love that you are the poster child victim of the accurately depicted as unfair and inaccessible unemployment hotline.
with your nearly finished college degree, sigh, i dont doubt weed had any factor in that. college took me a long time too.
here’s a tip: put down the bong, and take ANY job. finish college and then you can talk to the rest of us college graduates who can’t find a job because they all require a MA.
“So, that said, would anybody like to hire a well-spoken pot smoker dedicated to social justice and undoing institutional oppression?”
———–
This bears repeating:
“Schuyler used to work for Seattle Community Court, trying to help homeless, drug-addicted, and chronically incarcerated people” = worthless naive pothead with no skills who sucks at the taxpayers’ teats doing useless impotent liberal things “trying to help” a bunch of even more worthless and useless scumbags who will never ever change in ten billion years.
eli,
in your next segment can you invite posters both lovers and haters to post real job tips.
places that are really hiring not just windowshop/interviewing.
from craigslist to signs, ive found a lot of dead ends.
homegirl/fairy is pathetic.
You complain about Sky giving pot smokers a bad name…?
Seriously?
The guy’s got humanity & patriotism working for americorps, he’s ambitious enough to work the volunteer gig and do well enough at it that he got hired on again after the stint was up, he’s hardly greedy in his career choices (if not a touch idealist and altruistic), he’s using the press the way it should be- for the people (I’m happy to see one less ‘look how safe this new car is’ TV news feature that JUST HAPPENS to be the same model car shown on the evening news commercials all night), he took time-off first on his own dime (living off not grandma (who’s clearly got an empty nest/extra room), but off his SAVINGS- earned from WORKING) rather live on taxpayer money for his sabbatical (pot, beer or prayer, his break was a sabbatical, a ‘mental-health break’), and he’s applying to 3 jobs a day! Normally I’d call BS on the 3/day thing, but the guys so damn honest about potsmoking I’ll cut him some slack and assuming he’s naively honest about everything.
Contractors get UI if they pay into it: the law doesn’t discriminate based on w2 vs 1099 nor parttime vs fulltime. It’s law-mandated insurance, folks: you pay in, and if you qualify, you make claims out of your money that you paid in. It’s your money! There’s no “taking advantage” to be had. If you don’t have the required 680 hours of work, then you don’t get a dime. Don’t like the law as it’s been for a century? then: Vote. Write Patty Murray. Or Ed Murray. But STFU here.
The UI process IS terribly fawked up: the phone lines might be ‘open’ 24/7 but they sure as hell don’t answer 24/7 for new claims, and even the automated system rings busy 3 days a week now. Website has been down 4 weeks in a row now SUNDAY through TUES, so don’t tell me the interwebs are magically better: Washington’s ESD/UI was not ready for the flood of layoffs, plain and simple, and everyone: CPA’s, COO’s, Wendy’s Managers, and potsmoking social worker types, are having a hard time claiming their benefits that they paid into, that are in fact their right, thanks to sacrifices of union workers in this city a 100 years back.
If not for my company laying off 45% of it’s workforce, I’d hire this guy Sky in an instant.
Homegirl: I notice you are not using your real name, or website, yet Sky is. I presume you are as ashamed of your e-thug behaviour here as everyone thinks you should be. Pot smokers need more Michael Phelpss, more Matt & Treys, more John Stewarts, more Dave Chappelles, more Rick Steves, and even more Skys putting a face on the casual pot smoker cliche. The last damn thing pot smokers need is PR that includes an example that’s anything like you.
What’s with all the stoner hate? This is the Stranger… you know, the 5-page-spread-slobbing-the-knob-of-the-hemp-fest-articles Stranger. Try and keep up, leaning-right moderates. @32: hear hear
@5: you still have to wait for a decision AND deal with state-sized bureacracy BS: Letters, wait periods, required classes, orientation meetings and 2 trees worth of paper and booklets. God forbid you use your middle initial instead of spelling out your middle name: you just bought a one way ticket to 6week-delaysville!
@12: Pizza driver gig is a scam if ever there was one: car payment: 299-599/month. state-law-required insurance for young male: 175+/month. Gas: $2.oo-5.oo/gallon depending on whims of oil industry. Pizza wages: minimum wage (8 bucks), part-time (as in, we’re busy Thurs,Fri & Sat so those are the only days you can work), evenings only, and …I’m going out on a limb here.. but I bet you don’t tip more than a buck a pie, do you?
@35: I don’t know how you’re smoking yours, but lemme give you a hint: cheech and chong is NOT an instructional video: small joints /bowls get a fine high. .. you Dope.
@40: While it doesn’t get as much buzz as the first amendment, the 21st amendment makes getting drunk an actual right: it’s in the constitution and everything, asshat.
@51: a. by waiting 4 months and living off his own SAVINGS of money he earned working, he did a nice job of keeping the hell off the public dole: what’s to complain about?
@84 you have humanity. I’d like to have your space babies.
I would recommend removing this from your website:
“Now I spend my days refreshing Craigslist and writing tailored copy about my trumped-up skills and qualifications”
There must be a better phrase than that.
Main Entry:
trumped–up
Pronunciation:
ˈtrəm(p)t-ˈəp
Function:
adjective
Date:
1728
: fraudulently concocted : spurious
Oh, come on everyone quit trying to be judge and jury here. Obviously the guy is a good writer and you know what look at all the attention he’s getting. Most people that just “move to California and smoke pot everyday” don’t admit it. I bet a ton of people do that when faced with life changing choices. I don’t smoke pot but I’m pretty sure that if I did like it and I was depressed, 3 resume’s a day, wow, I would be smoking a lot at this point. Oh, I see, you all want him to hit the streets and look for change like the people that channel 4 news showed the other night!!!!
I say, stay on the internet and research, research, research. And, if your new employer is going to google you and see that you smoked some pot… good ridden you don’t want that one anyways.
@105, thanks for injecting some reason and humanity here. This comment thread has been breaking my fucking heart.
Such hostility…
For the record, I have a bachelor’s degree from a fairly well-respected college, I’m working on my masters’ from a fairly well-respected university, and have been steadily employed for the past four years. I actually have a job right now, a job that leverages both my undergraduate degree and my post-graduate studies.
And I still can’t pay my rent. That’s sounds like hyperbole, I know. “I can’t pay pay my rent, I can’t make ends meet,” etcetera and so forth. But I’m not exaggerating. My monthly income is less than my monthly rent. And just so we’re clear, I have two roommates and live in one of the cheaper neighborhoods in my city. Rent’s not going to get much lower than it already is.
Times are bad. And though I haven’t smoked pot in a good, long while, I understand where this kid is coming from. My drug of choice happens to be legal, but I’m not passing judgment. I know I need something at the end of the day just to turn night into morning and spend a few of the intervening hours unconscious.
I have an idea what some of you might say. My student loans barely cover the cost of tuition. The full-time jobs that would allow me the flexibility to complete my masters’ degree are few and far between in the best of times. And finding part-time work when you’re already working eighteen hours a week, attend five hours of classes, and can’t promise where you’ll be on a Wednesday afternoon in a semester’s time…well, it’s slow going. I could quit grad school, I suppose, but that seems like a step in the wrong direction.
Anyway. All that to say lay off the poor guy. He’s contributed more than many people ever will and all he’s asking for is a chance for an honest day’s work.
“…For all you children so concerned about my pot habit, get over it…”
Smoking pot isn’t really the issue. Being out of work, looking for a job while babbling on an internet site about smoking pot is.
You aren’t the sharpest tack in the box.
so far what has really bothered me about this post has been the responses. using sky’s frequent use of pot as en excuse to hate and condemn him is just simply ignorant, i guarantee most negative comments on this board have been made by EMPLOYED individuals. he’s an average guy just trying to find a job who can’t because unemployment is rising all around the country. and considering he held a volunteer job for 12 months in Seattle, i think that earns him the right to some fucking respect.
So, I just finally got around to reading all of this, and actually watching the video on KING5, and I’m surprisingly appalled. Knowing this situation pretty well, it is amazing just how blinded I was to how silly it all sounded for Sky to be the poster child of unemployment. However, I think that people are greatly missing the point here. You can thank the people who sit on their ass all day and bitch about people online for that one.
@91 No, that wasn’t me, I’ve been a little too busy hanging out with that guy I left you for, and WORKING.
And by the way, Homegirl is a psycho bitch. She makes good points, but after 50,985,847 posts it gets a little ridiculous and seriously creepy. Just because you have a “big girl” job, doesn’t make it okay to internet stalk and obsess.
Let’s try and focus on what this article was actually about. I applaud Sky for trying to be an advocate for others, but, perhaps next time keep your strong affinity for pot out of the media.
Good luck, Sky. I would say that I really hope it worked out for you, but I would be lying. So, I’ll leave you with this: I hope you were able to make your car payment on that shiny M3 of yours.