The need to feed

I just had a short conversation today with a friend of mine. It's kinda not the nicest exchange of words between supposedly friends so for his benefit and anonymity let's just call him Paul for the sake of this post.

You see Paul recently resigned from his work and may be gagging over the fact that he may be (well at least according to him) sent to the land of opportunity to meet uncle sam (and all those obese americans out there) by his new employer. Not that he is punctual at all with his work hours but so that there will be some sort of intro, I open my daily conversation with him about his being terribly late for the day. I asked him how come he can go to work that late and if he is on a super flexi schedule. He said that "he is already resigned". Me being tactless at times (may be an understatement) told him that he is an ingrate and that he should consider that some companies do background checks on your previous employment. To which he answered "a big so what? I don't need them".

I thought that there was something wrong with his answer and told him that if he doesn't need his new employer then how come he applied and landed a job there. To which he answered "there are many other companies out there and I am not running after them". I wanted to continue the discussion to hear more of his "witty" retorts and so I said to him that companies are not running after him as well. People come and go and it's all about business at the end of the day.

I wanted to discuss more of his reasonings but then I noticed that the conversation is slowly becoming an nonsense argument so I just said to him that he is immature and had some more out of topic sarcasms before he finally went offline for a while and I just thought that we had enough of that topic for the day.

The moment I pointed out that his negative ways, he bacame defensive at once and started deliberating about how he doesn't need his new employer. But the fact remains that he needed that job otherwise he doesn't earn his monthly disposable income. I understand the way he answered "so what" but what turned me off was the way he mentioned that he doesn't need his new employer (which implies he doesn't need his new job as well). I think that was way too misinformed of him to say that. He needs a job. I need a job. Everybody needs a job. That's a simple fact of life he failed to take into account when he blurted "so what". I think it's plain immature of him or for anyone else to be ungrateful to your current employer just because "you have tendered your resignation anyway". Unless of course your employment is mounting with issues after issues. That may be another legal story.

I don't have the perfect employment history but then if I am doing my job, I try my best to do it really well. I wanted a smart exchange of thoughts with him but all I got was his lousy overconfidence. I wanted to remind him that no one is indispensable and all but I don't think he is mature enough to realize that. I am not trying to project myself as the good guy here but I thought his reasoning was really off. Anyway, I just hope that he reads between the lines and realizes that all I was after was to tell him to grow up a little, especially that he is not getting any younger. He is still a friend after all.