American=Unemployed

I haven't been keeping up with this blog. It's just as well--likely no one reads it.

I started this, excitedly, as do most new bloggers, thinking I could document an interesting account of what it is to be American. I would write everyday and I would be able to etch my immortality into the electronic age.

Unfortunately, I have been uninspired. Unfortunately, lately, American to me means unemployment and cynicism. I have but an hour a day to write. I depend on the public library and can not afford to pay for internet access at home.

I read a New York Times Article yesterday (For Unemployed, Wait for New Work Grows Longer) that did not help matters, but did highlight that I am not alone by any means. According to the article, " As of November, about 1.8 million, or one in five, unemployed workers were jobless for more than six months, compared with 1.1 million when the recession officially ended in November 2001." In a month I will join the 3.6 million workers who ran out of unemployment insurance during the last year. My roommate and girlfriend just began her unemployment insurance last week.

We are college graduates. I have worked in politics for four years and she 1 and 1/2. We continue to look for employment, but every time we are turned down during an interview our hope erodes a bit more. It seems the only hope I have right now is to go back to college, gather more debt, and begin new and poorer than the first time.

Things do not look good in America from my vantage point. My American Dreams are not of Horatio Alger, but of my Grandfather, who as a small farmer raised a family of 9 children. Is this life even possible anymore?