Thank you for your consideration #4

"It's not who I am underneath, but what I do that defines me." -Batman in Batman Begins, 2005.

The dreaded question while unemployed and job hunting… So, what do you do?  Between Fall 2002 and Fall 2003, I was unemployed. I underwent the rite of passage for Gen-Xers of moving to my parents’ basement after having a full-time adult job and my own place. While job hunting, I took on a variety of jobs. Odd jobs. Odd terms of both inconsistent and just strange.

During this time, I dreaded that question. What do you do? It was inevitably the follow-up question after names were exchanged. I took this question seriously. Does my employment define me? If so, then I REALLY needed to refine my potential career path.  I am not a cog in the wheel, a mindless drone. But nearly every job (perhaps other than a doctor in a 3^rd world country, a missionary, a fine artist, or caregiver for special needs orphans) seemed like giving in to ‘the man’ and losing oneself to the machine of modern life in a capitalist society. What’s a good-hearted idealist to do??  As a life-long volunteer, I didn’t have a problem with grunt work or physical labor.  However, I did resent a (often sickeningly) low price put on my precious hours of life, energy, and effort.  One hour of my sweat, sore muscles, and deadening of my mind and creative capacities was really worth 5.35/hour? Even at $50 an hour, that seemed like prostituting myself. To do things I see no worth in, in hopes of maybe making  a near-living wage…this was no way to live.

What do you do?  Among my jobs as an over-qualified 20-something? While I submitted applications I worked as a receptionist at a lumber company, various data entry and filing jobs thru a Temp Agency, a dancer at an entertainment company, a picker/packer at a fashion designer’s warehouse, Life Portrait Model at an art league, Standardized test grader (I never thought that actual people had to grade the show-your-work math sections and writing section) and any house/dog/baby-sitting gigs that I could find.  Another day, another half-dollar.

My answer?  Whatever it takes.

For those who are disheartened at a society that judges people based on their job, I leave you with this quote: “I see the strongest and the smartest men who have ever lived... and these men are pumping gas and waiting tables.”  -Chuck Palahniuk, 1996. Fight Club, Chapter 19.