BROOKLYN, NY-

Working in Manhattan can be an exciting, thrilling experience, but it doesn’t have to be. For the first year of my legitimate-office-job-having life, I worked in a building entrenched in a cozy block of 7th Avenue, spitting distance from two of the most impressively banal landmarks in this city: Times Square and Macy’s. Now, things can get pretty hectic in busy digital media what with the constant barrage of emails, IMs, phone calls, and that woman from accounting shrilly dictating lists of numbers into her speaker phone. I soon learned, therefore, how valuable it was for the mental health of any office worker to unwinch one’s shoulders from their hunched slump, peer away from the computer screen, and make one’s way out into the city.

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WICHITA, KS-

Once upon a time, I was going to be the next bestselling author of deep meaningful stuff that everyone would grok and say, “Oh, NOW my life makes sense” and the world was going to be a better place for it. I was going to write with the humor of Douglas Adams and the depth of John Irving. My writing was going to resonate like Truman Capote’s and captivate like William Goldman’s, and have just a sprinkle of the meaningfulness of Camus and Raymond Carver. I was going to get my degree in English Literature and become a great writer, and nothing was going to get in my way.

Alas, I got a summer job at a truck stop.

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BAKERSFIELD, CA-

The orange truck came speeding south on H Street. My kid Landen, 17, said, “There’s that orange truck. I see it everywhere. It’s following me.” He was half joking, but it’s true. I recognized the orange truck’s driver. He lives with his wife in a little bungalow on Blanche Street, close to St. Francis of Assisi Church.

Sometimes I see the same person everywhere. There’s a disfigured man who seems to haunt me. He passes on a bus, walks past on streets. He once roamed campuses while I attended local colleges. He appears in libraries and grocery stores—even on Internet sites. I’ve seen him for nearly 20 years and have pointed him out. He’s everywhere. (more…)

SARASOTA, FL-

The global economy, like it or not, doesn’t like you. If you’ve acquired a job in a third world country, congratulations: You’re one step shy of a slave. If you’re an American, you can work, live and die at Walmart, which will soon offer funeral services next to the produce department. Are there, you Americans ask, no careers vouchsafed from the global suck? It depends. Do you possess sticktoitiveness and a can-do attitude? Are you a no-getter? Are you willing to take personal responsibility where you have none? Then the answer is, “Yes!.” Jobs await you, some already available, others waiting in the wings of hell. Love it or leave it, except you can’t afford to leave: Trust me, I tried. Here, then, is the future, and your opportunities within it. I have randomly numbered these jobs, for none are better than the others, though some are worse.

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GULF BREEZE, FL-

Over the weekend I took Feldman to the dog park.

I like the dog park here in Gulf Breeze.

It has a statue of a Great Dane.

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THE DEEP SOUTH-

10:10 pm

Fox’s Donut Den

Every good day begins and ends at the Donut Den. My music row buddy Bodi is here.

“Look at this,” he says clicking a clip on his iPod.

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PARIS, FRANCE-

I leave humbled.

Humble. It’s a word I never understood as a child. A word I don’t think I ever really understood until very recently. It’s a word, like bitter, that needs to be lived before it can truly be understood. (more…)

ATLANTA, GA-

In college I worked one summer as a line cook in a 120-seat restaurant of a small hotel in Florida.

Although I had no formal training as a cook, I was able to bypass the usual progression from dishwasher to busboy to line cook, going straight into cooking because my friend Tony Spagnolo worked on the line.

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(no longer) SONOMA, CA-

Not long ago, I received a letter from the City of Sonoma, informing me that my license to operate a rickshaw business had expired. This came as something of a surprise, as I wasn’t aware that I had a rickshaw business.

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SONOMA, CA-

Growing up, I thought I might want to be an animal doctor someday. Not because I had any interest in veterinary medicine. I was just a fan of Dr. Dolittle, the 1967 musical with Rex Harrison. As far as I knew, all veterinarians wore top hats and sang their prescriptions and had exotic patients like a llama with an extra head coming out of its ass.

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By R Kent

ARUSHA-

The United Nations is a great idea.

In theory.

It’s the “in practice” part that messes everything up.

Here in Arusha, the UN’s International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) is a good example.

The Tribunal, in existence since 1996, has been plagued by slow trials that take years to finish, and as a result, has a paltry number of convictions to its credit.

Defense lawyers routinely cry foul, accusing the ICTR of being a puppet of the government of Rwanda, as well as a tool for rich western nations to purge themselves of guilt over having not reacted when the genocide was taking place.

Resources are scanty.

Employees scrape for scrap paper and work on computers that would look more comfortable in a previous century.

Interns, like the lovely Isabelle, arrive fresh and ready for work, only to discover the team they’re assigned to is on a three-week mission in Rwanda. (more…)

LOS ANGELES, CA-

I played hooky from work today to support the striking writers.

It made perfect sense.

Besides being a writer myself, I’m also a teacher (the California Federation of Teachers supports the strikers).

That meant I had to ditch the classroom to support my brethren.

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CHICAGO, IL -

I cut my hair the other weekend, and by that I mean I took my clippers, a plastic bag and the extension cord out onto the back deck.

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PHILADELPHIA, PA-

Baltimore: where the liquid movement of caffeinated roads convert me from office worker to day tripper

For the rest of the afternoon, I should be seated in a windowless office in Philadelphia with nauseating fluorescent lights that buzz louder than maggot-infested roadkill.

This place makes me appreciate windows, enough so that I take breaks, wander to the bleak stairwell, and look through the one window there that can never be opened.

My office mate, J., should also be seated in this office all afternoon, where our predecessors sketched on the wall above our desks a ballpoint window with a shaky, though accurate, view of the city skyline, complete with a filthy pigeon that never flutters, eats, or shits. There’s an upside to everything if you want it badly enough.

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PHILADELPHIA, PA-

Welcome to the first installment of my first interview on TheNervousBreakdown.com.

I was inspired by Kaytie M. Lee’s interview of NOMAD, the graffiti artist, and by B. Francis Smith’s interview of David Breithaupt, Kurt Vonnegut’s pen pal.

I wanted to post an interview, but I had no idea whom to interview . . . until I thought about what has consistently interested me the most: the intersection of sexuality, law and culture.

In fact, all facets of sex and sexuality have interested me as long as I can remember. In the early ’80s, my folks let me take Dr. Ruth’s books from the library, something that other young grammar-school children weren’t doing.

Throughout three academic degrees, this intersection has regularly been my focus: mating and dating rituals, gender identity, sexual harassment laws, pornography regulation, obscenity laws, feminism, polyamory, rights for same-sex couples, sex work, and plenty more.

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