Diez Anos con Jim Thomson (Chapter 7)

Chapter (7) Lobster Jim

This might be boring filler, but it feels right.
My cousin Greg and I were playing in an undeveloped, weed infested field behind his home. We were twelve. There was a two feet wide by two feet deep irrigation ditch that crossed through the center of the property. On a hot desert day, water snakes frenzied at a slow point in the ditch, literally hundreds of them, because we later counted. Greg and I had never seen anything so amazing. We ran to his house for buckets and then ran back to the ditch to take ownership of some snakes. Most of them were arm length and an inch thick. As I placed the third load into my bucket, one of them bit me on the arm near the wrist. I dropped everything in my hands. I grabbed the end of that snake with my other hand and pulled it off. Then I grabbed it around the neck, and with a loud and furious primal scream, I ripped it in half, and then held both halves above my head in victory. I had fantasized about doing it all day, and when I had a reason, it couldn’t have been more fulfilling.
Jim doesn’t eat fish or seafood, but he worked at Red Lobster for more than a year as a waiter. He hated almost every minute of it. He worked as hard as he had to, and that was never hard enough for Red Lobster. He had a cell phone payment, car insurance payment, rent payment, and a computer payment. He asked me often what I thought would happen if he just quit paying his creditors.
I’d just started a job with a battery company as a delivery driver/battery salesman. I had to wear uncomfortable tight pants and a striped blue collar shirt, with two emblems, one for the company and one featuring my name. I worked there for a couple weeks and then had to get out. I can’t remember why.
“You should quit this job for me Jim,” I said, half joking, while I sat at Jim’s ditching work.
“Alright,” Jim said, “Why should I say you’re quitting?”
“I don’t know. Something.”
Jim dialed the number as I told him. I had no idea what he would say, but I could barely contain my glee. Quitting a job is an experience I’ve truly learned to enjoy. And that took some time. There’s an unmistakable high to it, and I might be an addict. It feels like being unshackled.
The more responsibility you have, the more money you can make. I don’t want it. Fuck it all. Hear that? Jobs are a dime a dozen among the slave class.
“What’s his name?” Jim said, as he waited for the connection.
“Grant.”
“Is this Grant? Yeah, this is Andy. I quit…Well, I just don’t like these pants. They’re really uncomfortable, and they’re not very stylish…Yes, this really is Andrew Blade. I quit, okay? Bye.”
I laughed and tried to hold it in, but there’s a good chance Grant heard me.
Not long after that, Jim told me he had stopped paying all of his bills, and that it felt really good. He did the least possible most of the time, and I’m proud to say he may have picked some of that attitude up from me. Shit yeah.