oh MY. Seems I missed the pah-tay...

Last month I did get an invitation. And I thought, 'What is THIS lame shit?' Because it was from the union, you see. And yes, I joined a union thirty years ago when I first got here. Because I thought, you never know if they might prove to be helpful some day. My family has some history with unions. My father got black-balled from most of the factories in my home town because he was seen talking to a union organiser when I was young. So I joined one for my branch of industry, and saw it as a bit of added insurance.

Right. Over the years, any time I ran into the people involved, well lets just say they were your proverbial fat cats. Bloated on power, literally, self-important bloviating people who were sort of off-putting. About eighteen months ago, it turned out they had mis-managed all the money we paid in dues in a seamy bank speculation deal in the US, which nearly bankrupted the bank I do business with here, and they used up all of our considerable (like a billion Euros) strike funds
to extricate themselves from the mess they made. Among other things. (update: I since learned they refilled the strike funds. Uh-HUH. And this inquiring mind wants to know where the hell they got THAT from, oh yes..... You just don't pull one billion Euros out of your nose, you know. It stinks.)

Well, it turns out that in thirty years, they never did one single thing to make conditions better for the branch of industry I work in. Not one. We are the worst-paid of any in the entire country. (It varies from state to state, but none of them are good.)

Two years ago, I had a huge run-in with the local state police on this issue. The guy was impudent, what we call a paragraph rider, aka stickler for the rules, and thought we were some sort of porter without education. And he thought we were getting paid a fortune to just stand around and greet people. He thought. Until one night, he got kinda sorta freaked out when he was in and we were busy, and he heard me going on in four languages fluently, and dealing with a lot of difficult stuff. But there was still this money thing, so I showed him what we earn according to what the union worked out with greedy hotel owners. He was so shocked, he backed down, and has been friendly ever since. There are two categories of contracts, one for the Angestellten, which I don't know how to translate other than they are 'privileged', and 'workers'. I belong in the latter category. How very lovely.

So I have this ambivalent to hostile attitude toward my union people, because they never fixed this. And cave in when it comes to getting us a survival minimum wage. Why does this remind me of the current crop of Democrats in the US? Rhetorical question btw....

When the misused funds and financial scandal came up, I nearly walked. Others I know have. I had a lot on my plate, so I left it, for the time being. And then I got this invitation to a party, you see. For a dinner at a restaurant at the airport. To get 'honoured'. Uh-huh. Well, I couldn't have thought of anything more BORING, or OLDIE than having been so stupid as to believe it meant anything at all. So I ignored the invite. And forgot about it.

Today I got this huge thing in my post box. From the union. With this letter saying how much they regret my not having attended their party. Right. And this elegant folder with a citation in it, thanking me for 25 years of belonging to the union. It is thirty, not twenty-five. And did they use my money for that shit? A letter would have sufficed.

That so sucked, I can't find the words.

Otherwise, I am going to be really fucking angry. So I am letting it out here before my blood pressure goes over 200 again. And that is not good.

My Grandmother once told me about taking my father and his sister to a union strike march in Massachusetts when they were toddlers. Police on horseback came in and tried to trample them, the women and children. They were ruthless then, they are ruthless now.

Far more ruthless.

But the people in the unions? THEY used to be courageous. Heros. Today? Fat-cats. Complacent, and they go hand in hand with corporations. So getting a citation from them? Is a fucking slap in the face. And my doctors say my high blood pressure is just from smoking. Hokay... Fucking blind.