Burnt Out in Rural Georgia
By: Samuel J. Boice
Tags: Personal Essay, Politics, Memoir, Work Life Balance, Progress

I work as a peanut inspector on behalf of the state of Georgia, as a temporary job during the pandemic. It’s fairly repetitive work, and it keeps me preoccupied considering I have 50-hour workweeks on average. I’m also a 29 year college student at Georgia Southern University and I’m on the verge of burning out. I take some solace in knowing that I’m in my junior year, but I’m losing my sense of purpose through the monotony of this one-dimensional schedule that I find myself in.

I work at peanut warehouse situated next to a cotton warehouse on the outskirts of town. After work, I’ll drive home when my car is available or I’ll get dropped off, or some times I’ll take a cab, but I always stop by to get an Arizona tea from the truck stop even if that means walking past the same coyote carcass every day.

Out here, there’s no Uber or Lyft drivers and there’s no taxis to pick from. I’m not taking about just the companies, but there’s literally only two cabs out here and both of them can arrive to the truck-stop in an hour at the earliest. There’s enough people in town to keep up demand, but not enough to grow the business to where they can afford to hire more drivers. Their rates aren’t all that cheap too.

I typically call Harold because he has the best rates and he’s a very congenial person who loves to talk. Harold started his cab company about 12 years ago, after he left the turpentine factory in Portal, Georgia. Portal is a small town of about 500 people, most of whom, have connections with the turpentine business and faithfully attend their annual turpentine festival, which takes place every fall.

Design for the 2020 Turpentine Festival which ended up being cancelled due to Covid.

Harold’s business has waxed and waned over the years, but he ultimately decided to work by himself because some of his former employees were being “dishonest with him.” He wants to retire soon, he told me in a beleaguered tone, but he came to the conclusion that it wasn’t feasible to do so. He went on to say:

" I’m burnt out. I’ve been working for over forty years and the money isn’t coming in and it looks like I’m never going to save enough to stop working. Things might change one day, so that people like me will be able to breathe and retire on time, but not in my life.”

Hearing the vulnerability in his gravel-like voice provoked tears, and I told him that I know things like this will change in your life-time because people are starting to wake up and realize this winner-takes-all economy isn’t working for the vast majority of the people. He said he enjoyed my optimism, while he smiled with his bloodshot eyes looked at me in the rear-view mirror.

We passed a couple of large yard-signs promoting Trump and he slowly shook his head. “ At least we got this dummy out of office,” he chuckled as he turned onto the highway. I nodded my head as I got onto my medium app to work on a piece about work-life balance and UBI. I read through what I had in a hushed tone, but Harold was listening closely enough to figure out what I was saying.

“ Is that your writing?” He asked as he placed his Bluetooth in a cupholder. I told him I was working on an opinion piece about why a four-day workweek and a Universal Basic Income would make our economy more humane. Lately, I’ve been able to bring up Universal Basic Income more organically and have had more success in convincing others of the need for one.

“ When you think of Japan, you think of a culture that revolves around work. That’s what we’ve been taught through the media, through Hollywood, but it turns out we work more hours on average than our Japanese counterparts. We are the most overworked nation in the world. The U.S. and Papua New Guinea, outside of a couple others are the only countries in the world that don’t have paid parental leave. We are the richest country in the history of the world, but we’re only this rich because these massive corporations freely exploit us and so it’s no mystery why the wealth gap is widening at dizzying pace.”

I fumed and then decided to collect my breath. Being poor for most of my adult life in the U.S. while having a decent amount of money, while I lived in China has kind of radicalized me, despite having some pragmatic tendencies. My history courses in high school taught me American Exceptionalism, but as I left the country I felt like the social mobility that my teachers clamored about, was more feasible abroad and I had some liberties abroad that I didn’t have in America. I can walk around and not get shot by another citizen. I can walk home, while drinking a beer and I made enough money that my Chinese friends gasped when they saw the balance on my bank account. I could also go to the hospital or a doctor on a whim and not have to worry about medical debt.

Harold loved the ideas of work-life balance and UBI.

“ I never have me-time. Sometimes, I have to skip a meal, and I rarely get a chance to spend time with my wife on top of that. If I had UBI, I can hire another driver, more people would be calling us to pick them up, and I can afford to possibly get a new car. I’ve worked so hard all my life too. I deserve to retire and have enough money to enjoy myself and the time I got left. Maybe eat some more healthy sh*t.”

Harold picked up the phone and talked to his wife. She cooked some jumbo shrimp and was wondering if he was going to be able to make it home.

“ You know, after I drop you off, I think I’m going to call it a day.”

He smiled, as he turned into my apartment complex. I paid my fare, tipped him, and said goodbye.

Harold contributes a lot to his community, especially to the minority community in the Bulloch County area. A lot of his clients work on farms, construction, and the restaurants in the area and a lot of them depend on him and his services, especially myself from time to time. Work-Life balance, whether that be a four day workweek, paid parental leave, creating more public holidays, along with a UBI would mean that people like Harold don’t end up getting overworked, and people like Harold can retire with dignity.