Enter your name and e-mail below to download a chapter from my book Are You My Life?: Searching for Self, Faith, and a Freaking Job. A Tale of the Twentysomething Transition
The chapter is titled Top Ramen Dreamer and is better than a heaping spoonful of that noodley-goodness. I promise. Check out the comments below and add your own.
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32 Comments
I read your sample chapter this morning and laughed until tears. Really funny stuff. I love this quote from Theodore Roosevelt about office cubicles, (well not exactly, but it’s easy to draw the parallel). He says, “Far better it is to dare mighty things, to gain mighty triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither gain much nor suffer much because they live in the grey twilight (*cubicles) that knows not victory or defeat.”
Paul, great stuff. I had a friend who is my age, close to 50 (ohh) who told me he no longer does anything he doesn’t want to do. He has always painted but now he is selling his art. He has inspired me, so I have started to write. Where might we be had we started when we were your age. I worked for an old guy who used to say “do what you do well, boys. Do what you do well.”
Great advise.
Great stuff, Paul. You’re definitely speaking the language of just about every recent and relatively recent college graduate. I really look forward to the book’s release.
I love it!! Man your writing is great!! Its dry humor and quite witty, and i relate so much to it. I laughed at the temp. agency experience, (had my own thank you very much!!) That was classic. I really look forward to reading more of your work!! I am gonna thank Chad for e-mailing me your links!!
Paul, I am have to agree with Adam I was in tears when I was reading this. Awesome job. Sadly enough it sounds like me first year and a half after college. Great work man, and I can’t wait to read the whole thing when you get it published.
This chapter made me laugh……I can’t wait to see what the rest of the book is like. Your sense of humor is a chip off the old Dr. Lou’s block! Maybe, just maybe, you won’t have to worry about the next job you HAVE to take, but can be published, become famous and we can say we knew you when!
Paul, you had me rolling from start to finish. This is definitely a book that needs to get out there. Now more than ever, people need your fresh and real look at things, (as depressing as it can be at times) see it for what it is, have a good long laugh and then start really living no matter what the cost! Can’t wait to read the rest of the book. PUBLISH THIS BOOK!
Great writing Paul!! So refreshing to be reassured that we are not alone in the hilarity/frustration of the “career” path and what it is we ACTUALLY want to do and finding out it has nothing to do with what we are trained in or experienced with or planned on. My favorite part was the pathetic Happy Birthday song and the cake because I’m pretty sure I had to have been in that same room at some point with the exact same thoughts! Good luck on the publishing, can’t wait to read the rest!
Great chapter, Paul. I’d love to read on and see how this transition helps in your struggle to “find faith, identity, and purpose”. Almost every college graduate goes through the same period of questioning, and unless one finds an ultimate Eternal purpose in life, the “transition” phase of wondering what to do with your life never really ends.
Ahh! You are hilarious, Paul. I love your imagery. You are right on with the work place, and bring so much humor and light to what can be such a mundane environment …which inevitability leads any individual on a serious soul searching escapade. This book truly relates to anyone who has ever worked any job, ever!! I am so anxious to read more! You have such a talent. Well DONE!
Paul- You painted the picture of every out-of-college-needs-a-job person. It helped me to look back at that time in my life-which is not an easy time- and take it lightly and laugh at myself a little bit! I enjoyed it all the way through! I’m don’t find myself in a cubicle often as I’m a teacher but you painted that life-style. It was a fun read and I’m excited to read the rest of it. GOOD LUCK!
Paul
I really liked it and can’t wait till it gets published so I can read the rest. My kind of humor, slightly sick and wrong with dry wit. Made me see myself in your writing. The slow slide towards the ultimate end , retirement as someones employee.
Thanks so much for shareing,
Amber
I read your chapter tonight and I thought it was really good. I definitely like the humor in your book. I feel like a lot of us can relate to this part in life. I can’t wait to read more of your book.
Funny and clever way to write about what you don’t want to be when you grow up. I am still trying to figure it out and I have been out of college for a long time. You really do a great job of describing the frustrations of temp agencies and finding a meaningful job.
I like it. Nice insight and a sarcastic touch of humor. I feel like this would be a great book for the young adult market. It definitely relates to the 20 somethings’ mindset.
Great read! To demonstrate such remarkable wisdom, wit and humor in one of life’s most serious challenges is quite a gift! We hope you find a publisher very soon so that you can continue your gift of writing. That sounds like a career you would really enjoy. You have a unique gift of communicating low predictability with high communicative impact!
~Dr. B.
This is hilarious. I love it and as a 24 year old about to be 25 I can certainly relate. I have worked many random jobs including baker at Bongo Billy’s Cafe, Physical Therapy Tech, and Assistant at a Chiropractic office. Looks like my degree as a Child Life Specialist is coming in handy. I think that all this random experience is God’s way of preparing me for something huge… I hope:)
NICE! I loved it
And I also don’t know why cubicles were ever invented…
Paul, this is great. It perfectly captures those moments right after college when you start to realize that this really is it. Yet, it’s done with such a funny hopeful tone.
Great Job and good luck.
This was hilarious and so true to life! I don’t know you Paul, but if your book were to be published I am pretty sure I’d buy it. Good luck!
Thank you for your insight. Your pondering is familiar to all of the communication studies graduates, I’m sure. Though our degrees may lack immediate direction, they do leave us open to the many possibilities that present themselves.
As for cubicles… I would also like to thank Mr. Construction Worker… you invented it because you don’t have to sit in it! Fantastic work Paul, I cannot wait to read the entire book (any maybe even get it signed 
Blessings. Go well, Katie
Funny stuff, but it stings a bit for all that have been there! Hope it gets published and you can have a prime rib from time to time.
Well done my friend.
It’s the timeline thing that I’m most frustrated with. So we’re kids right, and live life in a human way. We smile, we cry, we live.
Then it’s school after school, job after job, and like you said, “a couple houses, a couple cars,” and for what? To retire at 65, tired over-worked, and spent of passion?
For the last two years I lived in Vail, and went snowboarding over 100 times both years. Am I therefore, off track. Am I supposed to be doing something, now, and for the next 40 years, work hard and long, so that someday, I can go on vacation to Vail? That just sounds silly.
Inhumane is a word that has always fascinated me. Mostly because, when we hear it, we immediately think about animals. We think, how inhumane it is to wear fur, etc. shouldn’t inhumane mean, “not human.” Shouldn’t we be more concerned about how “not human” our culture is, our way of working, our drive for money, fame, power. And how “not human” it is for us, in pursuit of those foolish goals, to sit in cubicles composed of “rainy day grey” walls, for decades.
As brad pitt in “fight club” said, “working jobs we hate, so we can buy shit, we don’t need.” Well I personally say cheers to those rocking the timeline, but for me, I agree with you. I’ll take ramen and quesadillas with my dreams.
I’m proud to know you Paul, and well done chasing the dream.
Cheers.
Clark
Well done! I look forward to reading more! You’ve hilariously captured exactly what every new college graduate embarking on the real world thinks at one time or another. Good luck!
Hello – I am Alie Danial’s Aunt (by marriage) and she forwarded your site to me. I am a recreational writer and truly enjoyed your work. There is one line that stands out for me; your creativity really comes through in it: “We sounded like POWs singing to a fellow prisoner as we cut up a piece of birthday rat, right before our daily torture.” Loved that! I would lessen the reference to the movie “office space” as it prompts the reader to compare your work against the movie and I don’t think you want that to be an ongoing process. Finally – and please take this with a grain of salt, as this is the genre I fall into and the issue I constantly wrestle with – I’m not sure if you are making light of your situation or really trying to make a serious point. If both, that’s cool, but I’d rather laugh from my gut, that wonder if you are trying to be serious . . . you know what I mean? You have a gift! Keep up the great work!!
Paul,
What a wonderful read! It was raw, honest and a realization (to the rest of us) that we aren’t alone in this post graduation confusion of what to do next. Settle or find yourself?
Well done my friend and I cannot wait to read more. Thank you.
bs
Hey Paul, great chapter! Pretty funny stuff. I hope your brother kept a bottlle of Pepto Bismol in his desk so he wouldn’t risk taking 7.2 minutes in the bathroom.
Hey Paul! Nice work! I have a strong recommendation for you: read “Generation Me: Why Today’s Young Americans Are More Confident, Assertive, Entitled–and More Miserable Than Ever Before” by Jean M. Twenge. It’s a fun and fairly quick read, and is filled with fascinating insight on our generation and our hopes and dreams. I think it could be a really helpful tool for you in writing this book–it’s written by a sociologist of our generation, and addresses a lot of the issues you mention.
Other than that, my suggestion is that you re-read your work carefully with an eye for the tone you set. It’s a tough balance to strike, wanting to be funny and portray a very real issue, and yet not wanting (I assume) either to depress people or to sound like a whiner.
Best of luck! I’d LOVE to see more of this book.
Hi there – Amusing stuff, glad you actually acknowledged Office Space (one of my all-time favorite movies). I hope you do well with your book – look forward to seeing the rest. Good luck!
Paul, thank you so much for sharing this with me. I am completely hooked and cant wait for the book to be published. Please send me some chapters in advance! I seriously laughed out loud on every page. As a teacher, I always talk to my students about relating to their audience and to paint a picture in their mind. Well, you get a gold star in my book!!! Well done A+
You are an inspiration to all of us 20 somethings….what else IS out there? Well, please let us all know once you have figured it out
Nice write Paul! What the world needs is less cubicles. Don’t show scare college seniors too much with the ‘real world’
so paul, word! there were so many times in my cubicle job that i can remember struggling with similar feelings. like, has my life been reduced to only caring about my 1 hour lunch break? is that it!?!
thanks for sharing! i can’t wait to buy the book.
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