Alfred J Prufucked

Ah, the siren song of the non-job-job. Its melodious notes waft over the office drone at inopportune times, lulling one into a dangerous dream of all that could be if only she could follow that haunting harmony into the deep waters off career satisfaction coast.

I hold a job-job wherein I have been asked to write up a so-called "informal evaluation" of life on the island of misfit academics. In particular I have been asked to list my accomplishments from the past year and my goals for the coming one. As I am bored silly by the slow pace of said job-job in the summer months, I started to work on this ignoble assignment only to discover that I have accomplished very little and hope to accomplish even less. It isn't that I am unhappy here--far from it. I enjoy most of what I do. I am a bit burnt out by it even as I am not overly stimulated by it, but that is the main reason I took this job. My life outside of here is stimulant enough to cure a coke fiend. So no, I don't wish to overextend myself in pursuit of reaching lofty goals so I can look down from the heavens of serious scholarship. I don't wish to travel far afield for meetings or seminars at my own expense, which is less than money issues than life issues (see aforementioned coke fiend cure.) All I really want to do (and my desire to do this wanes evermore) is come in, do a good job at my actual job-job, and go home and do my life-life. And as it is, and certainly if I am asked to do more, then I need my palms crossed with far more silver than they are currently.

These facts do not a good self-evaluation add up. Also, said s.e. has no connection whatsoever with a raise of any sort. It's more like, let's talk about our feelings.

Here are my feelings. I think, no, I FEEL, why am I doing this? I feel now why, but really, why am I doing this? I have been working since I was 13 years old. I don't want to anymore. But I want stuff, and stuff costs money, so I have to exchange services for goods somehow. Fine. But I know that unless I get really really lucky with some windfall of fame and fortune sometime soon (or ever) I will always be poor as a churchmouse, so why aren't I doing something that makes me all the things a career should make one, and not worry about the financial gain?

Kids who come from money tend to beget more money in life. And presumably doing what they want to do. Not always true, but it's a lot easier to pursue certain careers like music or art or even do-goodering type of employment when you have the money to have hit the right schools and made the right friends and continue to have that bubble bankrolled while you intern at the Kennedy Center or traipse through Nepal or lived somewhere sans rats for grad school. When you just gotta pay the bills, it's tough to do whatcha wanna. But it gets harder, I think, to keep doing what you decidedly do not want to.

Two sides, one coin, really. Everybody's gotta make a living. I could make a way worse one, I could probably make a way better one. But therein lies the problem--I don't feel like doing any of it right now. I want to enjoy life, and have enough money to do things, and not feel like I am crawling out of my own skin as I sit behind a desk every day for not enough pay to do anything "extra" and even not enough to do everything "necessary." And I see so many around me struggling with the same thing. Being besties with mainly artists does that to a girl. But while we are no longer in the first flush of youth, but we are in many ways younger than our parents were at our ages. And we don't want to sell our souls to the company store, hold out for that gold watch, leave our big dreams and delusions of grandeur in the dust and replace them with prosaic realities and two-car garages. We want to enjoy our cake--the cake we baked and iced and served. And we should be able to. But the rich get richer and the poor get children--twins called debt and drudgery.

Where's the poetry in that?

Ruby Red

I have been slacking on the blogging. Clearly this was bound to happen as I am une slackere in many areas of my life. Reasons for not writing would include, I have not much to say. Just been doing the summertime and the livin's easy thing. So far it's been a pretty swell summer. But a pretty hot one too. I have discovered that I can grow vegetables and eat them! I have been cast in a play that scares the shit out of me! I am getting to do three concert shows this summer including the terrifying debut of JT2! And I am in the love with the nicest boy! These are the things that July has brought, along with a nice beach weekend courtesy of my two mums, a miniversary tour of our nation's capital, lots of frustrations at work, and an adult swim night. I plan to wrap it up with a wedding (not mine) and some craft beers (all mine.) Not too shabby, to be honest. But also to be honest, not much to write home about here.