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Riding With Psychologically Diverse People in Cars
My desk was stationed against a white wall, in full view of employees and clients stepping onto the second floor of the center. When I positioned myself into my chair, facing the bare white wall, a professional neophyte amongst the ostensibly grown folks, a sense of dispensability washed over me. Chronologically, I twenty-eight years old, still perceived as somewhat of a boy man.
For I was a distinctive employee, the only one at the Mental Health Center of Denver not afforded an office space. Additionally, I worked part time as the lowest paid person, expected to subsist on a measly nine dollars per hour. Fortunately, I was receiving checks from the state that year, a much appreciated supplemental amount added to the miniscule sum of money I earned at the job. A desktop computer was perched atop my desk at least, an acknowledgment of my status with the company.
Not too much was expected of me. The program manager offered warnings through anecdotes during my interview, as there had been other people who’d served the Mental Health Center of Denver in the role of Peer Assistant, securing somewhat middling successes. During the five years in which the job had been a viable avenue for some psychologically diverse members of society to gain reentry into the workforce, only one of the dozen who came before me had lasted longer than a few…
