Minesajackdaniels' Blog

My brother is 38 years old and unemployed.

I am so jealous it hurts.

He’s not unemployed in a “38-years-old, lives at home with parents, GSOH, looking for bubbly lady for f/s poss r/s” kind of way. He’s unemployed in a “I’ve worked from the moment I left university as an engineering graduate at aged 21 right up to now and 16 years later I think I’d like some time off” kind of way. He graduated from civil engineering in Trinity with a good degree, got a job with a civil engineering company, emigrated to England (to the dismay of my mother) and worked 7am – 6pm, five to six days a week, with a few weeks holidays every year to catch his breath.

…similar to how most of us operate.

He bought a flat, sold a flat, bought a house, is selling it, bought a car, had the wheels nicked, sold it, bought another car, had it nicked in its entirety, bought another car… come to think of it his luck with cars is similar to mine. He made friends, lost friends. He went on package holidays. He met a girl and eventually they got married. They haven’t got any children, by choice. She worked her job, he worked his. Sometimes they fought. We saw each other at Christmas, Easter and once every Autumn when the siblings had an annual beer-n-hillwalking meet in the Lake District of Cumbria.

Then one day apparently the humdrumhumdrumhumdrum of life’s rain got too loud on the corrugated roof of the hut of his soul, so he moved out. After that, he realised that you’re not ever supposed to keep your soul in a hut anyway. Doesn’t matter if you plant the front garden with petunias, and whitewash your picket fence. Your soul is designed to migrate with the seasons. Your soul is meant to sleep on the beach. Your soul should be lying on its back on soft grass in the middle of nowhere with a full belly, contemplating the stars. The biggest thing your soul should be worrying about is where its next full belly is going to come from.

It was a big shock to all of us when he quit his job. He was always the successful one. He’s the middle child. The eldest was the groundbreaker, who got two swings of the pick into the quarry and took a break to set up house and have a child. I as the youngest am apparently the unrealised talent. (Every so often, when the Autumns in Cumbria have been less about the hillwalking and more about the beer, we have heated conversations on who, precisely, it is we’re expecting to realise me. They want me to be found. I want them to get lost. It usually all works itself out between beer number six and whiskey number two.) So when Mister job-for-life relinquished his job to get back his life, there were various reactions. The groundbreaker decided to wait and see. The parents clucked and fluffed and fussed and worried. I waved pompoms in public and spat bottletops of jealous depression in private. The successful one revelled in the rebelliousness of unemployment.

For the first month, he did nothing.

Not. A. Thing.

Yes he slept and ate. He did the things we like to think we’d do if we had more time – go to the gym, fix the cupboard door in the kitchen that doesn’t hang right, drink a glass of fresh-pressed juice every morning.

At the end of the first month we all knew lots of things. The groundbreaker knew the successful one had made the right choice. The unrealised talent knew she’d be spending some time living vicariously through the successful one’s pursuit of an alternative reality. The parents knew it was the Wrong Choice and that He’d Soon Get Bored. The successful one knew that he had a lot ahead of him. He knew he needed the rest. He knew it was a good idea. He knew that the things that you think you’d do if you have more time are a bunch of bullshit and nothing like the things you’ll actually want to do if you DO have more time. He knew a lot of things weren’t certain.

…he knew there was no way he was going back to work.

At the end of the first month, the successful one took a hankering to see some of the world and learn a language. So he packed up a suitcase and the wife, in no particular order, and went to Panama for the second month.

During the second month we all knew lots of things. The groundbreaker knew that if he were in the same position he wouldn’t be in Panama. The unrealised talent knew she was sick of getting emails describing that little-known phenomenon, the Panamanian bus. The parents knew it was the Wrong Choice and sure he was Going to Get Killed by Weirdoes, or possibly Eaten in the Jungle. The successful one knew that he should have done this years ago. He knew that coffee never tasted as good as at the plantations that grow it. He knew that even though he was irritating the unrealised talent with emails about buses, she’d love their graffiti-covered, boombox-playing eccentricities if she ever saw one. He knew that when he got to his next destination he was going to take off the t-shirt he was wearing and burn it, because he had come to know that Panama is a humid place. He knew that the mechanical mules that guide the international shipping vessels through the Panama canal don’t use laser guidance systems, or torque measurement counters, but rather use two tired, sweaty, dozing men on either side of the canal who panic like bejesus when a vessel oversteers.

At the end of the second month, the successful one returned from South America and decided to spend the next few months selling his house.

During the next few months we all knew lots of things. The groundbreaker knew he was sick to his teeth of hearing about the exploits of the successful one. The unrealised talent knew she needed to make some major changes to her hut before her soul started collecting balls of string and bags of newspaper. The parents knew it was the Wrong Choice to sell the house, and it was About Time He Started Looking For A New Job.
And the successful one?

The successful one knew what it felt like to be released from slavery.

The shackles of success can wear heavy after a time. They begin to chafe. The more success, the more shackles. The accumulation of wealth is a means, not an end. But even if you recognise it as a means, you’re doomed if you cannot see the end.

So the successful one knows he wants a name change. For now, he will be the house seller. After that, he may try being the beekeeper, because it’s something he’s always wanted to do. Then he may try being the smallholder, because that too is something he’s always wanted to try. But he will only accept each name one after the other, as he concentrates on each task. The successful one knows that he has time, but he has more time than he has money. But the successful one knows that time is money, and that makes him the richest man in the world. The groundbreaker knows he loves his family and the succesful one’s choices are not for him. The parents know This Will All End in Tears.

What do I know? I know how to wave pompoms and spit bottle tops while planning my Panama.