Back in late February, my supervisor told three of us that another project had two permanent jobs opening up within the month. She said that she had been told to ask the three temps who had been here the longest whether we would be interested. We (Matt, Billy and I) were all interested, Matt and I particularly. We had been here since September as "temporary" workers, and were starting to feel cheated. Laura told us that she had no details on the job, but said she would tell us more later.
The next week, Laura tapped me on the shoulder and said, "can I talk to you?" and then she ushered me into the hallway. She had done this many times with Matt so that she could go into detail about why something he had done was not work safe. This time, she gave me a stack of papers labelled as a Questionnaire for the Office of Personnel Management and told me that the new job would require a type of government security clearance for contractors. I asked her if she knew yet what kind of job it was, and she said it was "on the FDA project."
I repeated, "so what kind of job?"
"Scanning," she said. I felt a bit let down, and I let her know. I didn't go to college so I could one day operate a scanner. Still, it would almost certainly have a higher salary, so I told her I would still take it if offered.
I filled out the form, and as a result everyone I had named in the form as a reference (including many of you, Kay, Scott, Jess, Anne) got requests from the gov'mint for information about me. My father got one as well. I was a bit surprised to see it, since it doesn't seem that serious of a job. I mean seriously, scanning for an FDA-contracted project, which probably means forms requesting approval for new drugs, doesn't seem like it would pose a risk to the nation's security.
A bit later, as we kept asking Laura when the position would be open (she had told us in March, maybe April, and it was getting pretty close to April), she kept not knowing anything. I told her to ask someone who might know. She did, and told us that the position wasn't open for a while; maybe May. I can't really do justice to my reaction, since I'm on a lunch break, but know that it wasn't positive.
In April, Billy, Matt and I all got paid to be driven in a company van to the FDA headquarters in Bethesda, where we were briefly interviewed by a woman named Vickie Vandevender and then fingerprinted by an electronic scanning machine. Again, this seemed a bit excessive, but I didn't think too much of it. It's pretty common that government jobs require fingerprinting. I was a bit pissed off, however, by the fact that the FDA project head brought along his younger brother to be fingerprinted. Moreover, his younger brother hasn't yet graduated from High School.
A little while later, I found out that there isn't even an opening at the FDA project. Not even a scanning position. Instead, they might have one at some time. This is the result of bureaucracy. It's like a giant game of telephone. Laura had never known any details about the job, and now, she found out, there is no job.
Yesterday, I was sitting in front of my two televisions, where two fifteen-month-olds were crying as their mothers left the room, then five minutes later running up and hugging them as they returned, then crying agian as they left the room, then five minutes later being really confused as a research assistant entered the room to play with them, then crying, then one last time running up and hugging their mothers. It's kind of like a drawn-out game of peek-a-boo. The NIH named this assessment "Separation and Reunion". I wasn't paying any attention to the tapes, or, rather, just enough that I could stop the recorders when the assessments ended. Mainly I was reading Philip Roth and listening to music. Then Laura tapped me on the shoulder and said I had a phone call. This has never happened before. I've gotten calls on my cell phone, which I had to rush to hang up on, but no one's ever called the office.
I took the phone, and heard a scratchy, fast-talking voice tell me, "This is Greg Delitros. I'm an investigator with the OPM. This is about your security clearance process. I'll need to interview you."
"Well, ok. Actually, as far as I know, there isn't any job here, so do you really have to interview me?"
"The government told me to interview you. I can't just call it off." This guy sounded like he was from Dragnet. "So, I'll come in tomorrow between 8 and 10:30. I'll just come up to the front gate, or the desk, or whatever you have. We'll have it in a conference room? See you tomorrow."
Now, as a temporary employee, I don't use the conference rooms; at least, not unless someone has put candy in them. This investigator didn't seem to know this. I got one anyway, as Laura went to the receptionist and told her in what I imagine to be an uncertain voice, "could one of my temps have a conference room tomorrow?" The receptionist said that this happens all the time, so it wasn't a problem.
Next time I get a chance, I'll describe the interview.
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