Crying for Cash

Ian Egan

For a few horrible months in 2010, I worked as a telemarketer for a “progressive fundraising agency.” This job consisted of getting cussed out and hung up on by people who already confirmed their strong belief in causes about which I was calling. It amazed me how people who freely gave each month to causes they believe in, from protecting the environment to securing equal rights, could come up with such vile names to call me for asking for a few pennies more. It didn’t help that I worked 4-9, which is amazingly enough when everyone in America has just sat down to dinner. People don’t like being asked for donations with an organic tofu “meat”loaf on the table. The best part was when I was personally accused of some kind of grassroots level unforgivable sin just for working there. One woman told me that she understood it was hard to find jobs in this economy, but what I was doing was a lower calling than begging for change on the streets and knocking over liquor stores.   Keep in mind everyone I talked to was a card carrying Democrat who had volunteered to put his or her name on my call list, yet they gripped their credit cards to their chests like dying infants when I called, fending off the attack on their purse strings with horrific epithets. This job was truly cruel punishment for the brash crime of needing some cash.

Beyond the torture that was the day to day in this hell hole, I sucked at the job. I took the insults personally and, in the three months I worked there, even though I worked on at least 10 campaigns, the only pennies I raised were for the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA). Despite giving up a dream of military service for a life of being gay, I couldn’t rake in a dime for the agencies fighting for the end of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell (I hear they did alright without my help) and being unable to legally commit to my partner, not a nickel came forth for ending The Defense of Marriage Act. Raising money for candidates running against the Tea Party was like squeezing blood from a cement turnip with a bad temper. It was only for the puppies that i could convince people to open their coffers. There is one reason for this, and one reason alone. Tears. I couldn’t help it. After hours of reading the same script about puppy mills and animal abuse the eye juice just flowed. I had recently begun fostering for a dog rescue and with every syllable, I imagined my fluffy little spaniel and the hard life he had escaped. My heart broke on every call and money poured in through the shower of my sobs.

I don’t know if the people I talked to were moved by my passion, or just felt sorry for me, but so much money was donated by my inability to control my emotions, that I was the number one call maker for that account. Being, at best, motivated by praise, and at worst, an attention whore, I was excited to see what awards and prizes I would achieve for my keen ability to weep my way into cash. My only recognition was my name, written in dry erase marker on wipe board, for one day. It was the most anticlimactic moment of my life, that didn’t include having sex with a man. It’s exhausting crying your eyes out for money, and I felt I’d earned an hour of PTO, or something to hang in my shared mini-cube at least. But no, my name, misspelled in grease pen, was my only reward. I quit that godforsaken venture the next day. It was better to be broke than living on the edge of emotional breakdown for minimum wage.  What good did come from this worst job ever was the lines of verse you will see in my next Poem Of The Week, a piece titled, Think of the Puppies.


*UPDATE* I wrote "Think of the Puppies" on the back of a pay stub from that awful job, and after a week of searching, it is apparently gone with the money it endowed. Sorry Guys.