On the Clock: What Low-Wage Work Did to Me and How It Drives America Insane

by Emily Guendelsberger

I’m overwhelmed by a surge of desperate gratitude—for my car, for the credit card I’ll use at McDonald’s, for my low-interest mortgage, for decades of regular dental care, for my college degree in two impractical subjects, for my husband’s ability to pay our bills while I try to shoot the moon, for my naive ideas about “normal,” for my ability to shrug and think, Fuck Darryl. I came to SDF8 to try to understand what it feels like to work in a fulfillment center. But the thing I really and truly understand now is that, regardless of how broke I may be, I’m the upper class. I always will be. I won’t ever really understand what it feels like to work here, because I know that I get to leave. You idiot. I take one more look at Darryl in my rearview mirror. I could still go back. But in the place I’d usually feel empathy, there’s just a shameful, overwhelming relief, and the words I get to leave.