Self-sufficiency
When I left grad school I didn’t have much brainspace for rumination at first. I had to find some way to support myself, pull my weight in the household. (I honestly can’t remember what David was doing at the time. I should ask him.) I didn’t start writing my tale for several months.
I temped, of course; I’d done it before, knew the temp-agency ropes, and needed the money. I worked for an architecture firm, a bank, the charitable arm of the local Catholic diocese, a few other places. Nothing exciting. Typing, filing, answering phones (and I hate answering phones).
And every tiny paycheck lifted my heart, because it told me I could make some sort of way in the world despite a resounding failure. I really could stand up, dust myself off, and keep going. I hadn’t known that. I’ve never forgotten it.
I started interviewing for temp-to-perm jobs. One such interview was with a sharp, brassy middle-aged woman who would have been my supervisor. I was overqualified, of course, and over-brained for the work I would have been doing, but it didn’t seem to bother this woman the way it bothered the law firm I’d interviewed for a legal-secretary position at.
After she explained what the job entailed, she said, “This is not, frankly, a very exciting job, though there are ways to progress within the company. Do you think you can live with it?” She gave me a look that meant no-BS, give it to me straight, sister, because I’m not going to hire you if you’ll hate me for it.
“Well,” I said honestly, “it’s not the kind of thing I want to do for the rest of my life. But I can do it, and I believe in doing the work I’m given as well as I can, whatever it is.” The look in her eye said that was the right answer.
I never found out whether I landed that job; I was interviewing for three at once just then, including the one I took that launched me on my e-text work. I do hope she found someone like me to hire, though, because both she and the hiree deserved it.
One job is not forever, not any more. It isn’t any sort of destiny, unless it’s made into one—and that can be good, or it can be hell. I’m not terribly clear why anyone, employer or (prospective) employee, engages in such thinking. Why am I, and the woman who might have hired me despite my so-called lack of suitability, so rare?
I don’t have a whole lot of personal sympathy for the do-your-dream people, and I fear it shows too much in this post.
Nonetheless.
I am still grateful that I can keep myself afloat economically. Not everyone can. The day may come when I myself can’t. I’m bloody lucky, is what it boils down to. That gratitude, that awareness of my own good fortune, runs like a loom-thread through every letter I type into that census database. I hope I never become so stupid or arrogant as to lose it.