A few points:
This is not autobiographical in the least.
The narrator isn't necessarily right or wrong in what he thinks, nor are his thoughts a reflection of my own mindset.
This will evolve into a story from its current monologue form.
I don't believe that by selling shoes, I'm helping to enable people toward living their lives better or more confidently. People ask me what I think I can do for the world selling shoes; that's what I tell them. I'm not deluding myself. I tell them, I just don't see how going back to school is going to make the world a better place, either. This superb logic is lost on them. I left for a reason and they don't seem to understand that. They saw me as happier when I was going to school, a more active and healthy person doing something with their life. The reality that I was miserable has faded from their memory and their own academic prejudices have redrawn the truth. Shoe sales is honest work, if nothing else. There's no ambition in the shoe store; with no ambition, there is little conflict. Everybody realizes the rut they're in and they don't waste their time digging themselves out. Nobody gets hurt, there's no disappointment beyond the obvious, there's no politics. We may fight or gossip or try to kiss up to the manager, but when we look each other in the eye, we understand. All of us who are over a certain age are at the point of no return. This creates a knowing camaraderie that neither the bright-eyed kids in college or the younger employees understand. School makes people become self-centered, there's no doubt. They have no choice but to focus all of their energies into themselves so that they can live up to the unreasonable expectations piled upon them by parents, older siblings, and teachers from the age of five. The longer a person stays that way, putting themselves first by necessity, the narrower their mind becomes. The people who've lived their whole lives at a university, either learning or teaching? They don't know the human condition.
Some of my former classmates come in sometimes. Of course, if they're shopping here, they're as broke as I am, but this doesn't stop the same condescending conversations from being repeated with a changing cast. They ask me how I'm doing, they ask if I'm going to school somewhere else, they ask if I'm taking night classes. When it becomes apparent that I've dropped from their ranks, you can feel the tone change. They mostly don't notice, but they talk a bit louder. Just like an idiot tourist in a foreign country, they think that volume is directly proportional to understanding. I help them find their shoes and I have them fill out the customer comment card. We shake hands when they leave, promise to catch up sometime over drinks. Some of the worst use this moment to try and convince me to come back. It's the physical contact, I'm sure. It's the idea that if you're literally holding somebody's hand and looking them in the eye, that you can cut through the cynical bullshit and make a difference. They think that if only I had moral support, I could go back to school and make something of myself. They want to be the person to dig me out of my hole for entirely selfish reasons. It's not their fault, I always tell myself. Society expects me to be ashamed of what I do for a living; it similarly expects them to be ashamed of me as well. I'm expected to be ambitious, to want nothing more than to scurry and slave so that I can buy more impressive things than my neighbor can. I'm not ashamed of what I do. I could honestly tell my former classmates that I'm being true to myself, if I thought that they would understand that.
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