Did you notice that most of the broadcast advertising this last week or two has focused on the now-traditional excess of day-after-Thanksgiving shopping? So did I, and I noticed something else. This year some of the retailers are actually calling it a “Black Friday Sale.” They probably think they’re being clever, but there’s an ugly reality lurking behind the advertising. Once a phrase trips lightly off the tongues of those who don’t have to live it, the meaning of the phrase gets diluted and that phrase begins to carry a false coating of humor and harmlessness. Most of those shoppers don’t work in retail on the front lines, so they have no understanding of just how deadly accurate the phrase “Black Friday” is; for them it’s a currently fashionable way to speak, an indication just how difficult it is, how brave they are as they venture out to shop, mostly for things they don’t need and quite possibly don’t really want. Clueless and quite happy to stay that way, it seems.

Unlike previous years, I don’t have to spend this morning behind the counter racing around while trying to look serene, smiling when I want to snarl, speaking in measured tones instead of screaming out my fury and just letting the tears become a fast-flowing waterfall, staying “on task” as the time scrapes by without the slightest hint of a break and with increasing pressure to do more and do it faster–in other words, working what has become the usual 8 hours. That’s become the usual, but I’ve worked every other Black Friday since I started with this company, so I can imagine quite accurately how much worse it is on this kick-off day for the holiday shopping season.

“But working people without breaks illegal; they have to give you breaks.” you say? Uh-huh.

Miss Rosy Glasses, may I introduce you to Mr. Cold Reality?

If that’s your first response then you’re very young, very naive, or not trying to survive for 14 days on a paycheck that barely stretches for 10 days (AKA “a wage slave”). Of course it’s illegal; so what? Nobody’s really all that interested in legalities when profit is involved. so when the high muckity-mucks decree labor cuts during holiday shopping season, and not meeting performance expectations can have a negative influence on your future earnings outlook, well…like most of the other “working poor” I know, I just keep going and pray it doesn’t kill me since I don’t have funeral insurance and my “estate” consists almost entirely of red ink entries.

So why am I up early thinking about this when I finally have a chance to avoid the trauma?

• Because I’m used to being up early now and it’s easier to stay in that mode than to sleep later and suffer getting back on schedule when my work week starts.

• Because work day or not, my body doesn’t like me laying down for too long any more than it likes me sitting or standing for long stretches; after about 6 hours of sleep the physical pain alone requires me to get up and get busy.

• Because there’s always something that needs doing–more somethings than I can keep up with, actually–so even a day off isn’t a day off. While I’m sitting here indulging myself in expressing my thoughts in writing, I’m not doing one of those tasks that really aren’t so bad, but I just don’t want to do them right now.

• Because I actually like some (not all, definitely not all) of my coworkers and I know the minute-by-minute hell they’re going through while I’m sitting here in my bathrobe.

• And to be painfully honest, there’s also some envy at work. I don’t have the fiscal wherewithal to indulge in this tradition of conspicuous consumption and probably never will. I’m bitterly and constantly aware that I can’t usually afford to send cards to people I love deeply, let alone brightly wrapped packages of non-essential items to family, friends, and acquaintances. Christmas gifts? In this apartment we’ll be living high on the proverbial hog if Christmas dinner is something more than a frozen TV dinner bought at the Grocery Outlet store. (That’s also the usual routine now–if it weren’t for stores that sell things nobody in the “regular” stores wanted, I’d be skipping more essentials than I already do. It’s seems doubly unfair to feel so poorly fed and not be able to lose enough weight to at least look as good as I pretend I feel. Oh well…nobody promised me fair, did they?)

It’s not multiple choice, by the way; all of the above, and more, are part of the answer.