He almost didn’t have any work for the last few weeks and was eating mostly tuna mayo sandwiches. A can of tuna cost about 60p and with a quarter of an onion, a bit of mayo and a few drops of Tabasco it could keep him full for almost all of the day. He didn’t go out much either. Laziness and self-pity, combined with the genuine knowledge that he didn’t have anywhere in particular to go to, kept him at home in front of the television. ‘It is only temporary’ he though to himself, ‘so its not so bad’. And although he wasn’t depressed, he was a little ashamed every time he spoke to his girlfriend. She was paying for most things at the moment, and he felt that this is effecting his manhood. ‘If only there was someone to beat up. But there wasn’t, and so the best he could do to show his girlfriend how much he appreciates her help and the fact she buys him cans of tuna, was to keep the house clean and do the cooking and laundry. Somehow, those actions, although greatly beneficial to domestic hygiene, did not make him feel more like a man. ‘I am an artist, a modern man that believes in equality, and if I was earning good money and my girlfriend didn’t, I wouldn’t have a problem supporting her’. Reasoning didn’t help much either.

He decided to try and ask the state for help, so his girlfriend wouldn’t have to pay everything for him. He went to the job centre to see if they can help him find a job. They told him they couldn’t help him find a job until he sign on for unemployment money. So he asked if he could sign on for unemployment money. They told him he couldn’t because he didn’t fill the right forms. So he took the right forms and filled them. Then they told him he didn’t have all the papers. So he went to the bank and to his landlord and to all the people he used to work for and to the tax people and got all the papers. Than went back to the job centre with all the forms filled and all the papers ready. They told him that he needed to come back in two weeks at the appointed time and gave him more forms to fill. When he came back two weeks later at the appointed time with the new forms filled they told him that they couldn’t help him because his girlfriend was paying everything for him and so he didn’t need the state’s help.

He asked his mother for money again. He was 29. His mother said she doesn’t mind helping him with money now, but that he needs to think about what he wanted to do. One option was to go back to study. Another option was to do a teaching course and become a teacher. There were other options too. It was very hard to decide what was the best one, because he never knew what was going to happen in the future, or if he is expected to start having success with his art. So he decided to keep his options open for the time and do nothing.

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