Over time I have learned to dumb myself down to fit in with the masses. I say "I seen it" and "youse" and "guys" instead of "people" to improve my acceptance rate with the status quo. But I don't look like a nerd, so this confuses people.I'm not particularly intelligent either. My high brow friends suffer me like a fool because I won't kiss any ass just because they are rich. They wag their fingers at me, tut tutting, pointing out this is why I never stay out of the working poor rut. I don't say "youse" or "I seen it" to these people, even though they say it, because I actually know it's not good grammar.
But I did get a promotion out of the working poor rut, working for a major corporation. The extra money was nice for a while, but my co-workers were actually just status quo folks who had fallen their way good paying jobs after being hired by a pair of psychopaths. The psycho's talked, "I seen youse guys" or my favourite "yizz'le" a contraction for "youse will" and they listened to country music.
I had never been fat, or even pleasingly plump, so at first in that job I stuck out like a hard-on in junior high school. Such has been my fate; to be singled out for being normal in with a bunch of oddballs.
We know it's true that we accumulate the habits of those we spend the most time with. So it was inevitable, I suppose, that although I had the self control not to lose my mind working with these slackers, conformists, and sexual deviants, that I did lose my waistline.
To fit in, I stopped bringing to work my bagged lunch of whole wheat sandwich, some fruit and vegetable sticks. After all, I now had the salary to buy lunch at the local diner. Sometimes we went to the Mandarin buffet for some of what I call "fried fried" - breaded fried food that is deep fried again, or ordered in thick crust pizza.
One associate, a really nice guy that was faking his way through being a materials broker, brought in trays of Krispy Kreme doughnuts for all us saps hoping he would get a lucrative contract. Some of us were hooked on lunchtime pita wraps filled with otherwise healthy fillings, dripping with mayonnaise. The sumo wrestler who made the wraps at his walk-in restaurant knew what middle income people liked, and how to disguise it as health food, so he was worshipped in kind.
After months of over consumption, when I got home from work I was too groggy and exhausted by all the eating to cook, so there came more take-out. More drinks. No sex. I felt, and looked, terrible, but at least I felt I fit in.
One day, a coworker took a digital photo of our lunch bunch, my peers - it was some one's going away party - while I was saying "youse guys". As the photo was circulated via the corporate Intranet my memory went back to the moment I was saying youse, and the penny dropped.
As luck would have it, I quit my job soon after, to join the ranks of the working poor, again.
Because I'm between full time jobs, I now have the time to walk everywhere I want to go, or take my bicycle, can't afford take-out anymore, I lost five notches of belt and 25 pounds. My breathing improved, I lost the burning spot in my gut and no longer suffer from acid reflux so don't have to take Nexium like candy.
I can sleep through entire night without waking up sweating but I've lost most of my high brow friends because "Youse is no use to us anymore.", they say.
I get bored easily, but it's 9:41 am and the public library opens here at 10. It's bright and warm, so I hang out there, reading newspapers and good literature for free. I feel it's good for my brain.
