To whom it may concern,
Herein, you will find a detailed history of my past employment and letters of recommendation from three of my four former supervisors. I would like to take the opportunity afforded to me vis-à-vis this cover letter to explain the four-year gap in my employment, from October 2012 to November 2016, when I was stuck in a corn maze.
As I continue my attempts to re-enter the workforce, I have come to learn that it is probably best to address the elephant in the room, or, in this case, the elephant in the corn maze. It has become abundantly clear that being stuck in a corn maze for a little over four years is a major concern for many corporate recruiters. It seems that the majority of people in management are of the opinion that someone who has been out of the workforce for as long as I was will have trouble keeping up with the many technological advances that have been developed while I wandered aimlessly around a corn maze for four years. Other employers have expressed doubt that a person who found himself desperately trapped in a corn maze for four years with nothing but the clothes on his back and his own increasingly bizarre thoughts could never effectively navigate the complex, labyrinthine world of modern business. And there are still others who have fallen victim to the unforgiving press I received and believe that I am as “crazy” or “unhinged” or “irredeemably stupid” as the papers have made me out to be when they reduced my four-year quest to escape a corn maze to a mocking piece of human-interest fluff. For all these reasons, as valid as they may be, I have had trouble finding gainful employment or even getting an interview. I have read a great deal about your company, and hope that I am given the opportunity to interview for this position.
If I am granted an in-person interview, I would hope that I would be asked, as is often the case during in-person interviews, what I would consider my greatest strength as well as my greatest weakness. If asked, I would say that I consider my greatest strength to be my resilience. There were many times during the four years I was ensconced in the corn maze at Deedleman’s Family Farm when I wanted to give up and concede defeat… but I never did. My determination to succeed was resolute and never wavered. I did not waver when the staff begged me over the loudspeaker to leave the maze at the end of the season. I did not waver when what was left of my friends and family stood sobbing, maze-side, and pleaded with me to stop throwing my life away, and that there was no shame in admitting that I had been bested by a maze intended for children. Only once did I waver, and that was in November of 2016 when Old Man Deedleman himself showed up with a court injunction and twelve armed-to-the-teeth, jackboot State Troopers and forcibly removed me from Deedleman’s Family Farm and Fun Center.
As far as my greatest weakness, I have to say that it would be my hubris—either that, or solving mazes. I have come to accept that I am very bad at mazes. Although, I do not think that I would have ever spent what turned out to be one-tenth of my life lost in a corn maze had it not been for my hubris. My complete arrogance in the face of what I considered to be an easy-to-navigate corn maze and my boastful, albeit unearned, pride in my own abilities would turn out to be my ultimate downfall. If only I had accepted the flag-on-a-long-pole that was offered to me by one of Old Man Deedleman’s teenage employees at the entrance to the corn maze, instead of scoffing at the insinuation that I would ever need to be “rescued,” maybe the staff would have found me and forced me out sooner. If only I had left the maze at the end of the season that first year, maybe I would not have had to subsist on rotting corn or the stepped-on bits of candy left behind by countless maze-solving children for four grueling years. Or, if I had simply followed my friends who had been through the maze earlier that day back in 2012 instead of insisting I knew how to get through the maze on my own because I was a “smart boy,” maybe now I would not be legally barred from coming within 500 yards of Deedleman’s Family Farm and Fun Center, or be able to look at a piece of corn without breaking out into a cold sweat.
There are those that say I did not learn anything throughout the four years I spent lost in a corn maze. Specifically, the manager of the Hardee’s where I was working at the time I went into the maze, the only one of my past bosses who refused to write me a letter of recommendation. He said that I threw away a promising career in food service to pursue a pointless endeavor, and he is absolutely right. So, you see, I have learned a valuable lesson. Maybe I didn’t learn it during the first year I lived in self-imposed exile in a prison made of corn, nor did I learn it at any point in the three years that followed. Still, I most definitely learned my lesson during the six months I served in county prison after I assaulted Old Man Deedleman and two State Troopers while being dragged, kicking and screaming, out of the maze I called home for four years.
I very much hope that you will be impressed with my résumé, and I ask only for an opportunity to show you how dedicated a worker I could be for you and your company. I also request that, should I be invited in for a follow-up interview, you provide me with precise, turn-by-turn directions as to the location of your office building as well as a detailed description of how I get to your specific office once I enter the building. A top-down schematic or floor plan would be greatly appreciated.
Thank you for your consideration. I sincerely hope I am given the opportunity to work for Rand McNally.