What Have I Become? -- or -- Where's the Rest of Me?

I certainly never meant to be a travelling door to door encyclopedia salesman.  I was looking through the job ads, and there was something about educational products, and I called for an interview.  I met with Richard, a 50-something gentleman, articulate and impeccably dressed.  He immigrated from Jamaica as a teenager, dirt broke, and had climbed to his current position of relative power all by himself.  I can only imagine how many encyclopedias he had sold, and he certainly sold me this job without my even realising it.  Of course, almost everything he told me was a flat out lie.  No travel ("Well, after training, we like the new trainees to go out with the crew leader for a week or ten days, to get away from distractions, you know"), no cold calling (lie!), and any number of other falsehoods and misdirections.

But by the time we had invested a week or more in training, gone on our first road trip (Three frigging weeks in Saskatchewan and Alberta!  How's that for a "week or ten days" for you?) and had our first tantalizing brushes with success, there were those of us who put the lies behind us and tried to make the best of it.  About three quarters quit within a couple weeks, but those who stayed, stayed.

After my second road trip, I found myself at home for a few days.  A longer break than usual, it gave me time to reflect a little.  I was starting to get a nagging little voice in the back of my head saying that something was not quite right.  That this wasn't exactly what I was supposed to be doing.  Too bad the voice didn't speak English.  Or maybe it just wasn't speaking loudly enough.

My old school buddy Chris was having a birthday party.  I hardly knew anyone there, and I found myself talking to I nice fellow who, understandably, asked me what I did for a living.  I, however, was at a loss for an answer. I hadn't really thought about it, and didn't have an answer prepared.  I paused to think about what had brought me to this moment.  Straight A's in high school, my pick of universities, a planned career as a veterinarian, then getting my lazy butt kicked out of university, the newspaper job ads, and now . . . what?

"I'm a  . . ."

What?  I put it together in my mind for the first time as I said it to Chris' friend at the birthday party.

"I'm a travelling . . .

. . . door-to-door . . .

. . . encyclopedia salesman."

Chris' friend looked at me kinda bemused, I guess wondering if I was having him on or not.  Apparently satisfied that I was serious, conversation moved on to other topics.  I wonder if he even noticed my pause, since it seemed to me like a lifetime's worth of thoughts went into it.  It might have been half a second; it might have been ten.  But my view of myself was forever altered.

The next day we had a big meeting for work in the head office.  Periodically we did this if a couple of crews found themselves in town at the same time.  It was an opportunity to schmooze, discuss concerns, share ideas for improving our pitches, etc.

Ladies and joims, I had a concern to share with the group.  It wasn't exactly Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, but it was my life.  "This job isn't what we were promised.  I never expected to be on the road all the time, and it wasn't supposed to be cold calling and knocking on random doors all the time, and it wasn't supposed to be all about encyclopedias.  Yesterday, someone asked me what I did for a living, and you know what I had to tell him?  I told him I was a travelling door to door encyclopedia salesman!"

The other newbies looked at me like I had just brought the Ten Commandments down from Sinai, and looked silently and accusingly at the bosses.  The bosses, especially Richard, looked at me, nodding sympathetically, as though they realised it had just been a matter of time before someone said it.

The next day, we were back on the road.