Men?

Q.  Hi Auntie.  I want to know about men.  Why are they so attached to their Jobs?  In this economy, lots of guys are laid off, and they are miserable to live with!

Signed, Wondering in the Yadkin Valley. . .

Dear Wondering,

This is such a Big misunderstanding. People didn't use to have Jobs.  People don't naturally have Jobs anymore than birds or turtles do.  What people have naturally is Life Juice, that wants to express itself helpfully, doing enjoyable tasks that need doing. This whole idea of Jobs is a later invention that involves Satan and garages and it’s complicated. Men and women deal with this differently, like just about everything else. But you want to know about men, so here we go. . .

About the time History was invented, it became clear that tiny helpless people only came out of one brand of adult, the one also equipped to feed it. It was easier for the brand of person who didn’t have babies hanging off its chest to kill saber-toothed tigers; scary hairy beasts that saw babies as lunchables. Full employment, everybody doing what they did best.

But then saber-toothed tigers disappeared, and people started planting seeds and staying put. Men began to wonder what they were good for, except for planting baby seeds which by then had gotten figured out as necessary to the whole thing and which was enjoyable every time, at least for them.  More research for women in the enjoyable department was required. 

Men were looking for something to do, like be in charge of something and about that time The Old Testament was invented.  And there it was, The Book of "JOB"! Everything was fine, as it usually is in the beginning, God and JOB are good.  But then Satan shows up and starts making trouble (which is his job, you will notice) and  JOB's life as he knew it dissolves, just like your friend’s has done.


The screws on Being Without Jobs wrenched even tighter when a man named Steve took a bite out of an Apple - The Old Testament again - and invented a bazillion dollars in his garage.  Now everybody with a garage is expected to do the same thing, especially men because they are the only ones who go out there.

And that's where we are now, with the men friends who are on the down cycle of JOB.  That's what they are doing on the couch, just taking a little nap, in between pondering the Big Questions: What is it All About Anyway?  And What is My Role With My Family Now That There Are No Saber-Toothed Tigers? And Is God Mad at Me? It just breaks Auntie M's heart.

But here's something Auntie M has never understood.  There is never never never never any shortage of work that needs doing, by everybody, men and women.  If your J-O-B disappears, what you have is T-I-M-E, which you were always complaining about not having when you had the J-O-B.  

If you can just get enough life juice to get off the couch and look out the window, I’ll guarantee you'll see at least five ways you could help out, right now, from picking up all that litter on your very road, to washing windows for that elderly woman who lives down the street and has no business on a ladder.  Or if that’s too much, just smile at somebody that looks like they need it. We can all help.

So Wondering, here's the thing: just remember that these cranky people you are having to vacuum around have simply had a Giant Memory Lapse.  They have temporarily forgotten the big ol' hunk of wonderment that they are. They just got so used to letting whomever's name was on a paycheck tell 'em how much they were worth in round numbers, they forgot about way back when.  And their Life Juice is on Low.  They need our understanding to help get them turned back around.

Don't give up.  Remember, God never ever lost faith in Job and vice versa and it all worked out in the end.  Job got all his camels back, had ten more children, and lived to be 140. And that was before Viagra.

Now I’m going to give myself a rest.  There are other questions desperately needing Auntie M's attention.  Later on,  I’ll get back to M-O-N-E-Y, and how women (mostly) handle this whole employment question differently, seeing as how ever since babies and laundry and men were invented, no woman has ever been without something to do.