Chapter 4: Silverman Turns the Corner
David Silverman hardly recognized himself. Wearing slacks and button-down in lieu of jeans and T and straight as a rail, (other than any residue they might find in his urine) he had shifted hats and become one of twenty new recruits in the Pottery Barn catalog sales training class. Much to his surprise, his classmates on the whole were an older, well spoken crowd, and at fifty-seven he was neither the oldest nor the greyest. As introductions were going around he found himself becoming duly impressed by the quality of the people in the room.
There was a young woman getting her master’s degree in sociolology and a lawyer who had just taken her bar exam and was going to answer phones while she bit her nails and waited for the results. There was a scuba diver coming up for air and the owner of a bed & breakfast that had fallen on hard times, assorted teachers, students, retirees, and massage therapists, and one psychic who was slowly returning to the phones from a severe bout with burnout...
“I liked the talking to people on the phone but after a while I couldn’t get into their problems anymore. I began losing interest in the people who were calling in and that’s not good.
“And the business got rough. I was working for several psychic services at once depending on what you want... love life, health tips, pick the daily lottery, whatever. But I couldn’t tell which service it was by the ring.
“So one time this guy calls and I say “What line are you calling for?” and he yells at me, “You’re the psychic, you tell me!,” and hangs up.
No one confessed to wanting to be in catalog sales all their lives. This might be a rocky moment, but it was not a Rocky moment. Several folks did say it was a nice steady job to retire into, and some probably would. What all did agree on was that since they had to do something, this was a positive and gentle something they could live with, at least for the next three months. As he listened to their stories he felt like an intellectual snob. And I thought it was just me. What an ego.
When it was David’s turn he said he was an unemployed philosopher doing this because all the classified ads in the paper under Philosophy were missing. Everybody chuckled, including the instructor, a large man who visually fell somewhere between Santa Claus and Blackbeard.
David had already decided that he was in this to maximize the money, so he signed up for the 10:30pm to 7:00am time slot. That had an additional 15% over base, up to $8.33 an hour. It was a nice incentive, but he would have done it anyway even without the money once he found it was available, fueled by the memory of his long ago summer job running freight elevators on Madison Avenue in New York City.
Third shift was special, quiet, peace, watching, waiting, couples staggering home, drunks staggering somewhere, car sounds careening off concrete towers...
...tires squealing, whirring steel revved to its limits as the first newspaper truck of the morning flies around the corner on two wheels spewing out tommorow morning’s here and now at his feet. Bags of bagels left by the deli door. Life goes on. Third shift is a nice time to be alive, a nice time to be. For David there was still something romantic about midnight to eight. And yeah, he could do this. He really could.
Three days later, trained and ready to go, David Silverman was back in front of a computer, only this time in an ergonomically designed chair, at an ergonomically designed work station, his fingers resting on a customized ergonomically designed keyboard. Off to one side at an ergonomically designed reaching distance from what should be proper ergonomic posture sat a telephone keypad with its own LED, and he was connected to the telephone via headset. On his other side vertical slots held copies of the latest catalogues for Pottery Barn and its sister companies as well as blank forms, a list of office telephone numbers, and cheat sheets that explained everything he was supposed to do step by step, just in case he forgot. What else did he need? The clock switched over to 10:30. He signed on and waited.
Over 200 such work stations filled the carpeted, grey walled, second floor open space in a neat and orderly fashion. A few were surrounded by movable partitions. That’s where the supervisors sat. Over 50,000 calls a day were expected during the peak holiday season and the company was gearing up and ready to go. But at the moment only three people animated the surroundings. David, Pamela, a young Philipina who was the overnight supervisor, and ag, a short nervous man whose station was far across the room from David’s. He hadn’t been in David’s training class.
bbbrrriiiiinnnggg…
“Pottery Barn, this is David. How can I help you?”
His very first call, was a man from Juneau, Alaska who purchased gifts to be sent to friends in Texas. His second was a woman in southern California and his third, a lady from Colorado named Silverman. He smiled as he typed her name into the computer. Compared to a lot of the connections that popped up in life between him and the cosmos it wasn’t big time synchronicity, but at least it was fun, what with all the other names out there. I mean what are the odds? It gave him a feeling he was where he was supposed to be.
bbbrrriiiiiinnnggg...
“Pottery Barn, this is David. How can I help you?”
There was a lady from New Hampshire who called at 1:30am his time, 4:30am hers. “You’re up late”, he said by way of small talk and she spilled out her guts about why she had insomnia because she lives in a small town and everyone is shunning her after finding out she is having an affair with a man ten years younger than she is. She wanted to know what he thought about it and placed an order for a bedspread. He told her it was okay with him, he lived in San Francisco where anything goes between concenting adults and she could expect delivery within five to seven working days.
It was nice and quiet, just the way he had hoped it would be on the third shift with the message board registering 000 calls in queue and 0.00 waiting time. During the day, he had been told, there could be as many as 50 to 60 calls lined up waiting for a sales rep to take the order. It was nonstop. And to think they were actually paying him an extra 75¢ and hour, not to mention making it possible for him to find a space in the parking lot.
At 2am additional crew arrived and plugged into the stations around him. The east coast would start calling in soon and the pace would pick up. The idea was never to have a caller hang up because they got tired of waiting.
On break he went into the lunch room, brewed a fresh pot of coffee, and refilled his cup. Free coffee he thought, nice perk. He was forced to take half an hour off for lunch, or rather the company was forced by law to give him a break in the middle of the eight hour shift. There was nowhere to go and nothing to do and he had already told himself that eating a meal at 3:00 in the morning every night for three months would not be a good idea.
He hadn’t brought a book, a situation he planned to correct starting tomorrow night. As a last resort he headed to the product room to look at the items from the catalogue spread around on tables up close and personal, though he felt a slight ambivalence at doing it off the clock.
Sales reps were encouraged to look and to touch, to learn what the company carried so they were better able to answer any questions a customer might ask. “Have fun”, Pamela said when she suggested he do it, so he took the individual letter stocking holders that spell N O E L and moved them around. When he left, P E A C E, J O Y, and L E O N were on display and he wondered if anyone would notice.
There is such a potential for intellectual snobbery within me, he thought as he headed back to his station. Why do I look down on “things” and people who like “things”? Why do I think it is more important to help someone find their way onto the path of conscious awareness than to help someone buy the right gift or set an attractive holiday table? Doesn’t the Dalai Lama say that the purpose of human life is to serve for the benefit of others as much as one can? Why should it matter how it is done?
As usual, the internal dialogue played through. Because it’s an issue of what I can do with all my talents, all my skills, all my gifts, all my abilities, he answered himself. All of me, why not take all of me? I’m not putting down order taking. He could hear himself already excusing the elitist way these thoughts would project onto paper. It takes common sense, concern for others, even disposition, pleasant phone voice, and one week’s training to do this. There are a lot of people out on the street who can’t do this job and I’m sure Pottery Barn turns down the majority of people who apply.
But I know what I’ve been given, I know what I have. It’s not that I’m so special that the world can’t get along without me, it’s just that I’ve heard that what you are born with are God’s gifts to you and what you do with them are your gift to God. I’m just trying to be realistic and use myself to the max. That’s why taking phone orders doesn’t seem so fulfilling, I know I can do more. I know...
bbbrrriiiiiinnnggg...
“Pottery Barn, this is David. How can I help you?”
The sound in his ears and the lights on the keypad intruded on his thoughts as they would for the next three months. He took the order, signed off, and keyed in the transaction code, automatically putting him on line again ready for another incoming call.
bbbrrriiiiiinnnggg...
“Pottery Barn, this is David. How can I help you?”
You want this... you want that... you need this... you need that. How many... what color... yes, I think they would look good together though I have no idea why you are asking me... yes, we can get it to you by next Thursday... yes, I’ll have the driver leave it around the back if you’re not there... yes, it’s all taken care of... yes, it is amazing how easy it is. I just need your credit card number please.
bbbrrriiiiiinnnggg...
“Pottery Barn, this is David. How can I help you?”
I am Santa Claus, Santa Claus wearing a headset. What’s wrong with giving people things that they want in exchange for something they obviously value less than what they’re exchanging it for? Money. Nothing, that’s what. Who am I to place value judgements on what is or isn’t important in someone else’s life? No one, that’s who. I’m not always sure what’s the most important thing in mine. The purpose of human life should be to serve for the benefit of others. Well that’s what I’m doing. Exactly what I’m doing. How can I help you? Where do you want it sent? And the expiration date?
At 7am David ran the coded badge he was wearing on a chain around his neck through the time clock and headed home. Too tired to write the weekly Papagram to Adam, he photocopied an old one and sent it instead.
There was a young woman getting her master’s degree in sociolology and a lawyer who had just taken her bar exam and was going to answer phones while she bit her nails and waited for the results. There was a scuba diver coming up for air and the owner of a bed & breakfast that had fallen on hard times, assorted teachers, students, retirees, and massage therapists, and one psychic who was slowly returning to the phones from a severe bout with burnout...
“I liked the talking to people on the phone but after a while I couldn’t get into their problems anymore. I began losing interest in the people who were calling in and that’s not good.
“And the business got rough. I was working for several psychic services at once depending on what you want... love life, health tips, pick the daily lottery, whatever. But I couldn’t tell which service it was by the ring.
“So one time this guy calls and I say “What line are you calling for?” and he yells at me, “You’re the psychic, you tell me!,” and hangs up.
No one confessed to wanting to be in catalog sales all their lives. This might be a rocky moment, but it was not a Rocky moment. Several folks did say it was a nice steady job to retire into, and some probably would. What all did agree on was that since they had to do something, this was a positive and gentle something they could live with, at least for the next three months. As he listened to their stories he felt like an intellectual snob. And I thought it was just me. What an ego.
When it was David’s turn he said he was an unemployed philosopher doing this because all the classified ads in the paper under Philosophy were missing. Everybody chuckled, including the instructor, a large man who visually fell somewhere between Santa Claus and Blackbeard.
David had already decided that he was in this to maximize the money, so he signed up for the 10:30pm to 7:00am time slot. That had an additional 15% over base, up to $8.33 an hour. It was a nice incentive, but he would have done it anyway even without the money once he found it was available, fueled by the memory of his long ago summer job running freight elevators on Madison Avenue in New York City.
Third shift was special, quiet, peace, watching, waiting, couples staggering home, drunks staggering somewhere, car sounds careening off concrete towers...
rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrhhhhh!!!
...tires squealing, whirring steel revved to its limits as the first newspaper truck of the morning flies around the corner on two wheels spewing out tommorow morning’s here and now at his feet. Bags of bagels left by the deli door. Life goes on. Third shift is a nice time to be alive, a nice time to be. For David there was still something romantic about midnight to eight. And yeah, he could do this. He really could.
* * *
Three days later, trained and ready to go, David Silverman was back in front of a computer, only this time in an ergonomically designed chair, at an ergonomically designed work station, his fingers resting on a customized ergonomically designed keyboard. Off to one side at an ergonomically designed reaching distance from what should be proper ergonomic posture sat a telephone keypad with its own LED, and he was connected to the telephone via headset. On his other side vertical slots held copies of the latest catalogues for Pottery Barn and its sister companies as well as blank forms, a list of office telephone numbers, and cheat sheets that explained everything he was supposed to do step by step, just in case he forgot. What else did he need? The clock switched over to 10:30. He signed on and waited.
Over 200 such work stations filled the carpeted, grey walled, second floor open space in a neat and orderly fashion. A few were surrounded by movable partitions. That’s where the supervisors sat. Over 50,000 calls a day were expected during the peak holiday season and the company was gearing up and ready to go. But at the moment only three people animated the surroundings. David, Pamela, a young Philipina who was the overnight supervisor, and ag, a short nervous man whose station was far across the room from David’s. He hadn’t been in David’s training class.
bbbrrriiiiinnnggg…
“Pottery Barn, this is David. How can I help you?”
His very first call, was a man from Juneau, Alaska who purchased gifts to be sent to friends in Texas. His second was a woman in southern California and his third, a lady from Colorado named Silverman. He smiled as he typed her name into the computer. Compared to a lot of the connections that popped up in life between him and the cosmos it wasn’t big time synchronicity, but at least it was fun, what with all the other names out there. I mean what are the odds? It gave him a feeling he was where he was supposed to be.
bbbrrriiiiiinnnggg...
“Pottery Barn, this is David. How can I help you?”
There was a lady from New Hampshire who called at 1:30am his time, 4:30am hers. “You’re up late”, he said by way of small talk and she spilled out her guts about why she had insomnia because she lives in a small town and everyone is shunning her after finding out she is having an affair with a man ten years younger than she is. She wanted to know what he thought about it and placed an order for a bedspread. He told her it was okay with him, he lived in San Francisco where anything goes between concenting adults and she could expect delivery within five to seven working days.
It was nice and quiet, just the way he had hoped it would be on the third shift with the message board registering 000 calls in queue and 0.00 waiting time. During the day, he had been told, there could be as many as 50 to 60 calls lined up waiting for a sales rep to take the order. It was nonstop. And to think they were actually paying him an extra 75¢ and hour, not to mention making it possible for him to find a space in the parking lot.
At 2am additional crew arrived and plugged into the stations around him. The east coast would start calling in soon and the pace would pick up. The idea was never to have a caller hang up because they got tired of waiting.
On break he went into the lunch room, brewed a fresh pot of coffee, and refilled his cup. Free coffee he thought, nice perk. He was forced to take half an hour off for lunch, or rather the company was forced by law to give him a break in the middle of the eight hour shift. There was nowhere to go and nothing to do and he had already told himself that eating a meal at 3:00 in the morning every night for three months would not be a good idea.
He hadn’t brought a book, a situation he planned to correct starting tomorrow night. As a last resort he headed to the product room to look at the items from the catalogue spread around on tables up close and personal, though he felt a slight ambivalence at doing it off the clock.
Sales reps were encouraged to look and to touch, to learn what the company carried so they were better able to answer any questions a customer might ask. “Have fun”, Pamela said when she suggested he do it, so he took the individual letter stocking holders that spell N O E L and moved them around. When he left, P E A C E, J O Y, and L E O N were on display and he wondered if anyone would notice.
There is such a potential for intellectual snobbery within me, he thought as he headed back to his station. Why do I look down on “things” and people who like “things”? Why do I think it is more important to help someone find their way onto the path of conscious awareness than to help someone buy the right gift or set an attractive holiday table? Doesn’t the Dalai Lama say that the purpose of human life is to serve for the benefit of others as much as one can? Why should it matter how it is done?
As usual, the internal dialogue played through. Because it’s an issue of what I can do with all my talents, all my skills, all my gifts, all my abilities, he answered himself. All of me, why not take all of me? I’m not putting down order taking. He could hear himself already excusing the elitist way these thoughts would project onto paper. It takes common sense, concern for others, even disposition, pleasant phone voice, and one week’s training to do this. There are a lot of people out on the street who can’t do this job and I’m sure Pottery Barn turns down the majority of people who apply.
But I know what I’ve been given, I know what I have. It’s not that I’m so special that the world can’t get along without me, it’s just that I’ve heard that what you are born with are God’s gifts to you and what you do with them are your gift to God. I’m just trying to be realistic and use myself to the max. That’s why taking phone orders doesn’t seem so fulfilling, I know I can do more. I know...
bbbrrriiiiiinnnggg...
“Pottery Barn, this is David. How can I help you?”
The sound in his ears and the lights on the keypad intruded on his thoughts as they would for the next three months. He took the order, signed off, and keyed in the transaction code, automatically putting him on line again ready for another incoming call.
bbbrrriiiiiinnnggg...
“Pottery Barn, this is David. How can I help you?”
You want this... you want that... you need this... you need that. How many... what color... yes, I think they would look good together though I have no idea why you are asking me... yes, we can get it to you by next Thursday... yes, I’ll have the driver leave it around the back if you’re not there... yes, it’s all taken care of... yes, it is amazing how easy it is. I just need your credit card number please.
bbbrrriiiiiinnnggg...
“Pottery Barn, this is David. How can I help you?”
I am Santa Claus, Santa Claus wearing a headset. What’s wrong with giving people things that they want in exchange for something they obviously value less than what they’re exchanging it for? Money. Nothing, that’s what. Who am I to place value judgements on what is or isn’t important in someone else’s life? No one, that’s who. I’m not always sure what’s the most important thing in mine. The purpose of human life should be to serve for the benefit of others. Well that’s what I’m doing. Exactly what I’m doing. How can I help you? Where do you want it sent? And the expiration date?
At 7am David ran the coded badge he was wearing on a chain around his neck through the time clock and headed home. Too tired to write the weekly Papagram to Adam, he photocopied an old one and sent it instead.
* * *
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