Your Unemployed Daughter

Happy Columbus Day!

True, it’s one of our more dubious American holidays, placed so closely with Canadian Thanksgiving as to seem a second thought (not that Canadian Thanksgiving is a second thought, at least not to Canadians). Today, many hardworking American folks aren’t even awarded the day off for Columbus’s troubles.

And what were Columbus’s troubles, exactly? Well, in 4th grade, I chronicled them in a book project with my best friend at Indian Trails Elementary (How much you want to bet it has a new name now?).

We called our work “Columbus’s Diary,” and oh, the juicy things he could relate in first person! Via our intently researched account, you’d discover that he and the queen—well, let’s just say there was sexual tension. Beyond that, he was hungry, and tired, and a bit whiny during his travails. And, it bears mentioning, perhaps not the most PC of fellows. Also, there’s some evidence he had syphilis.

Nonetheless, dear Columbs persevered and discovered America, which of course was more a matter of luck than any kind of natural ability; if he hadn’t found it, surely some other explorer would have bumped into it eventually.

The word “discover” might not be all that accurate, semantically speaking, seeing as how people had already been living on the continent for ages. Once the C-Man landed, he went to work enslaving and killing off that indigenous population, which I guess prevented them from disproving his claim to fame. Luckily.

See, luck is not nothing. Luck keeps you from breaking your leg on the weekend even though you’re wearing 4-inch heels, or from being the one whose apartment burns down (putting out the candle helps too). Luck allows you to locate a looming land mass amongst swarming oceans, and makes it your name in the history books, even if there is some backlash. Luck can even get you a job.

I suppose I’ve been what some would call lucky. Maybe I have a bit of the Columbus in me (I am part Italian, after all). Having worked in magazines for 10 years, I know a lot of people, and some of them, at least, remain in the position to help me.

So they’ve hooked me up with other people, thought of me when they needed freelancers, booked me for work, recommended and even interviewed me for possible jobs. Not that I have one yet, of course. But did Columbus let that get him down?

You could call it luck, or maybe “good navigational skills,” but either way, let’s raise a glass of pumpkin ale to Mr. Columbus, who might just be a patron saint of sorts to us job searchers in the end. What’s harder, finding a country or finding a job?

I guess it depends on the unemployment rate. There, we’re not so lucky.