Farkle and the Pursuit of Employment

During the time I've been out of work, I have discovered a new pursuit: Facebook Farkle. This is a dice game, a game of chance, and I'd like to think, of skill. But mostly of chance. I've played this enough times to have schemed an approach, a strategy to prevent the dice from getting the best of me.

The rules of Farkle are important to this post, so I'll explain them as succinctly as I know how. You must score at least 300 points per turn, and you must have at least one scoring die in every single roll. If you don't, you Farkle! A Farkle is a cataclysmic disaster in the game of Farkle. Not only can you roll no more, but you also lose all the points you'd accumulated in that turn.

So if you score big on the first roll, things are easy. You decide you're happy and you end your turn. But - and here's where skill becomes helpful - let's say you don't. We'll say you get two measly 'fives,' and nothing else that's at all useful. When this happens on the first roll, I tend to use the first 'five' so that I can progress to the next roll, but I leave the other 'five' in the pool for the next roll. I don't get points for that second 'five,' but it raises my odds for a higher score in the long run.

Today I had an interview. The young woman who did my initial interview introduced herself, then led me through the store, down a narrow, white hallway, up some stairs, through a door requiring a key code, down another hallway, and into a barren, windowless office. She offered me a seat. I took it and she took the other. She then explained that the position I'd applied for had already been filled. Would I consider a seasonal job as a team member?

Would I consider a seasonal job as a team member . . . Just then, I realized that I was hungry. I'd been too nervous to sleep well last night, and I hadn't had my coffee, so I was also tired to the point of feeling achy. I was over-dressed for a team member interview, and none of the questions I'd mentally rehearsed last night were even going to be asked.

Of course I'd consider the job. What else was I going to do? During the course of our discussion, I watched the interviewer's cheeks flush as I disclosed that I'd been a counselor. Thankfully, she made no comment, but rather, she clutched her paper with both hands, her gaze fixed on the questions before her. She read each verbatim, and noted my replies in the spaces between the questions. Only when she had finished did she look up. Her eyes seemed redder than before, but she asked me to wait for the next interviewer. Was this one of her first interviews, or had my own nervousness worn off on her? Could it be that she was surprised to find me so much in need of work?

I'd rolled a five . . . but I hadn't Farkled. In fact, I was offered the job. Part-time, seasonal, making pizza. I figured that at $8.00 an hour, I'd take home somewhere between $500.00 and $600.00 a month. That's better than nothing, but I'd hoped to be able to repay my mom and step-dad for the gas and groceries they've bought for me. I won't have enough left over for that. BUT - I've found work!!! For the time I spend making pizzas, I'll strive to be an excellent pizza-maker.

There are some silver linings to this approach. Because this position is part-time, I still have the time I'd need to find something more career-oriented, and I could probably work this around my schedule as an evening job to help me earn back my losses. As a full-time team leader, I might not have been able to do this. And since I'm making pizza, my resume might just get some street-cred. This is more important than it initially sounds. See, I know that pride doesn't pay the bills. I've applied at businesses in the past, but they haven't taken my application seriously. And all the jobs I've worked over the past ten years have required my master's degree, so I can't very well dumb down my resume. Lastly, the interviewers promised me that the company has opportunities for advancement, and they sounded as if they'd be somewhat flexible to my scheduling needs.

Success in a job hunt is a combination of skill and chance. I have a certain degree of skill, so I'm holding out hope. Unlike Farkle, there is always another roll in the job world. Although the competition is steep, it's a matter of submitting a lot of apps, stacking the the odds in our favor, and being thrifty till we get back into the normal pace of life.