My second interviewer was a Guido, though he might have been Hispanic. I couldn’t stop looking at his fingernails because I avoided his narcissist glare. Those nails were so Goddamned well-manicured and flawless, a muted fleshy-colored nail bed that was deliberately smoothed and polished, and everything about the dude was thought out, attended to. He was one of those guys who are put together and takes great pride in his appearance, every sickening slick detail. His hair, his clothes, his grooming, impeccably formed, shaped, trimmed, and meticulously dressed, like a proud turkey dinner. He is the type of person who embodies the cynicism that presentation is everything.
He was a stark contrast to my first interviewer, a plain White lady who was probably much younger than she acted. She was genial and friendly but a furtiveness in her eyes struck me as untrustworthy. Or was it me? Did I imprint my lack of trust on her?
I didn’t even notice her nails. Or eyebrows.
“Oh my God, one of your eyebrow hairs is so long and sticking out really far,” my wife noted from the passenger seat as I drove us on an errand the same day, or maybe the day after, the job fair. “I hope that wasn’t showing during your interview.”
“It probably was,” I allowed. “It’s like how do you say ‘I’m 60’ without saying it.”
The “job fair” was a mass in-person interview, the second step in my hungry pursuit of a job I was too excited about. Rule 1 of job hunting in 2025 is never be excited about a job until you’re hired. Temper your expectations if you value your emotional well-being.
I had applied for a full-time, permanent position with a great company, the perfect swan song job for someone like me who is willing to devote another 5 or 10 years to the working life, and the firm, before logging off one last time. Also, I need to pad my retirement since I’m too young to hang up my loafers but still too old to embark on a new career. This iteration of a job hunt has proven to be the most excruciating I’ve ever experienced, so when I received an invite to a video interview on MS Teams with “ACME Inc.” for a role I applied a couple of weeks ago, I was elated.
I hid in our bedroom for the Teams interview which went OK. The interviewer from ACME Inc.’s HR department was a stern Asian woman with thick-framed trendy spectacles and a dry manner. I couldn’t get a good read on her since I normally don’t perform well on video interviews, or video anything. The interview was not spectacular, but when it comes to tossing your dignity out the window and pandering for a job, what is?
A couple of days later I received an emailed invite to a job fair which ACME Inc. was hosting for the “dynamite quality control technician” position I had applied for. Essentially a ton of people applied and after being vetted via the video interview, were now participating in a cattle call job interview to settle the hiring process for the role once and for all.
I wore my finest suit which was just a suit I bought in January for a previous job interview but had not taken the time or effort to make the necessary alterations. I used a temporary hem tape that allowed me to shorten the slacks without needles or thread being that I was too lazy to take them to the seamstress. I drove to the 1 pm meeting at an industrial park office building about a half hour from home. There was a horde of applicants, most half my age or younger. I was only 1 of 2 men wearing a suit which I optimistically calibrated as an advantage. The conference room was quite large. On one of the walls, two large observation screens were hoisted at a height that allowed full visibility to everyone sitting in the room.
We were all seated at tables scattered throughout the room. It reminded me of a reception hall that was playing host to a wedding reception, not an auditorium set-up. I was one of the first to sit which allowed me to watch everyone file in, a crowd that was split down gender lines and roughly mirrored racial proportions across society, so it was “diverse” in the truest sense of the word. Many people began speaking comfortably with their neighbors, proliferating conversation pockets throughout the room while I sat silently and spoke to no one. The only verbal sound I made was to over-laugh like a try-hard bro sycophant while I listened to a couple of guys at my table glumly muse about work and driving here and the unbearable nature of SoCal commute ordeals.
I loathed the possibility of sitting in this torture chamber for 3 more hours.
ACME Inc sent a rambling crew of employee representatives who were permanently employed “dynamite quality control technicians” to greet the tables and mingle. They strolled around, weaving between tables with their hands outstretched as if to stroke our shoulders, speaking to applicants, trading small talk, bantering, and answering questions or giving pointers about our present predicament. They sagely shared what it was like to work at ACME Inc. and they were generally a very friendly, if not slightly dorky, greeting committee.
Not friendly to me, though. Each time they walked by me they didn’t speak. I felt like they didn’t even look at me and I knew this because I made it a conscious effort to break outside my comfort zone and acknowledge their presence with a glance whereas I normally avoid looking at people if possible. When they approached our table, they would talk to the two younger guys or sometimes to the very talkative older Hawaiian man (or whatever the hell he was) who sat across from me.
They avoided me, though I think one of them asked if I had my first interview yet. Just doing their job. It seemed like these secret societies and cliques were forming before my eyes and I was excluded. Conversation was widespread, pertinent to this job fair and the interview process, and I sat idly, deeply unconcerned about the why of it all.
Initially, we were summoned individually for a first interview. As I said, my first interview was with an indistinguishable lady who asked me a series of questions about my work history which I tend to find myself sounding like an over-explaining loser whenever I’m prompted by job interviewers.
Yes, my last employer was affected by the SAG and WGA strikes in 2023.
Yes, my last employer was small and couldn’t weather the slowdown in business caused by the strikes.
Yes, my last employer brought in another person, a previous subordinate of my manager, to replace me.
No, my last employer didn’t want me.
No, I’m not working and that’s why I beseech you to please please please hire me even though I’m old and I have unruly eyebrow hairs and gnarly fingernails.
After she was done with me we walked back to the conference room and I had a seat at the table while I waited to be called for the second interview. The room was in flux with applicants coming and going, being called for interviews, firsts and seconds, maybe even thirds, I had no way of knowing. Socially confident people blossomed and they engaged their table mates and the floating ACME Inc. representatives, building random camaraderie and schmoozy vibes that shamed my rudimentary ability to fit in. I felt consciously avoided but not quite self-conscious, not quite caring while sinking comfortably into the chair alone and untouched by the social chaos of this quasi-network mixer. This was turning into one big nauseating LinkedIn orgy and I didn’t want any part of it.
But I did wonder. Was there something wrong with me that was beyond my control? Was it my wild eyebrow hairs? My friend in high school was fond of telling me I had a dead stare, something he claimed all Mexicans had. Maybe my visual engagement wasn’t endearing or approachable. My eyes don’t smile.
I heard someone say my name and I looked up because I couldn’t tell where it was coming from. I saw the Guido standing there with my folder (we all had folders, our dreams and dwindling aspirations sitting snugly in white folders with our names printed in the front) and he repeated my name. I raised my hand hesitantly and stood up and approached him. My smile was weak and we shook hands and I followed him to the interview room. There are forceful introductions, there are weak introductions, and there are flaccid obligations. This was the latter.
“When he saw your fingernails he probably thought, not hiring,” joked my wife, my critical superego, when I told her about his manicured fingernails.
I don’t get it. My fingernails are not fancy or pretty but I trim them and I’ll admit, my cuticles are not fussed over, but I hardly think my fingertips are aesthetically repulsive.
“I can’t believe they wouldn’t hire me because of my fingernails,” I mused ironically. It’s the kind of shit you say, a melange of rhetorical and ironic and bitter and cynical thoughts that are like rubbing salt in your fate’s wound. There are some personality traits me and my wife do not share, but cynical pragmatism is one we very much do share.
As I drove home from the job fair, a faint hope lingered that I might get the job. The hope was diminished as I thought of my second interview, of the Guido’s barely disguised schoolyard appraisal upon our introduction, of his indifference, that suppressed yawn when I asked a couple of questions. I knew I was not getting any favors from him during management’s deliberations after the applicants had all gone home.
The real problem was my performance while waiting in the conference room. I didn’t think of it at the time but it was clear in retrospect. This was not just a conference room where we waited: it was a room where applicants were summoned to display their social acuity, their networking and personality skills. We weren’t there to just kill time or they wouldn’t have flooded the floor with employee reps looking for chit-chat. All their friendly faces and interaction-prodding was not an accident. This was a part of the interview process, the character test, an exercise to ascertain our ability and willingness to enter the fold.
The ACME Inc. reps were entrusted to note which prospective applicants were measuring up on the “team player potential quotient.” I did not measure up. There were also those annoying personality measures disguised as situational puzzles on the initial assessment sent after my video interview. Personality was an essential metric for roles like this; join the team, or don’t join.
I never had a chance, no matter how much I lied on my carefully crafted answers. My asocial personality can be restrained but it can never be muted. The real me is always revealed: not a “team” player, not joiner.
When we finished up our interview, we walked toward the main entrance where I would steer right, toward the conference where I would wait for the next interview or the green light to go home.
“Hey David, thanks for your time,” he said and extended his hand. I leaned over and grabbed his fingers and shook weakly. I grabbed his fingers like a weirdo. I shook his fingers and wondered just what the fuck I just did, and why. I had gone mentally blank, and along with my long eyebrow hair and unkempt fingernails, I offered the wimpiest handshake possible.
“Thanks, nice to meet you, thanks,” I answered. I didn’t remember his name at all. I don’t remember names.
But he was Guido and I blame him.
