Effective today, I am an unemployed bum without a bum.

Two weeks ago, the boss sent an email to all mechanics asking if any of us were interested in a seasonal layoff. The selling point was that we’d be eligible for employment insurance. Around this time of the year last year, I was working ~20 hours a week. I often came into the shop to do something other than fix bikes, such as organizing the nuts and bolts in the tiny drawers: it was bleak. Why have a repeat of that?

Before booking it from the shop, I made the boss pinky swear to rehire me in four months. He had a splinter on one pinky finger, but the other one still had loyalty coursing through it. Our right pinkies intertwined, manifesting an unbreakable contract.

I have a long list of arts and crafts projects I want to do. This sabbatical should give me the time to build a toddler, ie. learn how to crochet, finish sewing my first pair of pants before it’s shorts weather again, and tone up my glutes.

I spent almost the entire summer wearing shorts with an elastic waistband, thus postponing the realization that I’d lost weight. This has bumped up my power-to-weight ratio and also robbed me of whatever butt I had.

There’s very little meat on these bones.

Continue reading “The door hasn’t closed.” →