What to Do?
I’m stuck on this question lately of what to do with myself. When I moved out to Los Angeles, I started freelancing for educational companies based in New York. I had a great year last year and made a tidy little income. Lately, though, the jobs haven’t been coming in as fast and furious as they had been, and I’m contemplating a career change. But what to do? Here’s what I can do: write. Pretty much anything. Need a catchy tagline for a movie poster? No problem. Here are a few, just off the top of my head:
- For a horror movie: He’s just hanging around … UPSIDE-DOWN. He is a vampire.
- For a romance: Sometimes the thing you’re looking for is right behind you: love. (This would be for a movie called Love Is Right Behind You.)
- For a buddy comedy about old people: The only thing they forgot was their teeth.
So, obviously I can do that kind of work. But I can’t get that kind of work, because nowhere on my resume does it say, “comes up with amazing taglines for movies that don’t exist.” And now that I think about it, even if it did, it probably wouldn’t help me much. If you look at my resume, you would think that the only thing I knew how to write was brief, 1 page stories and questions for standardized tests, because that’s how I earn my living. But I also know how to start publishing companies, write novels, program websites, and write catchy songs on demand. I believe I am a highly marketable person, but the marketplace does not seem to agree with me. No matter what you might hear on the Today Show “Job Watch” segment, it is far more important to have a rigid career definition than the ability to think outside the box.
And that even goes for jobs for which I have gobs of experience. Even though I’ve been a founding member of two publishing companies, I could never get a job at a publishing house, because I only know how to run them, not how to be employed by them. I’ve written a 250-page spelling review book and a vocabulary book of similar length, but where does that skill get me? More anonymity.
Here is my challenge to the universe: give me a sign that I can make a living doing the kind of writing I enjoy. Wake me up tomorrow morning to find that I’ve gotten 500,000 hits on my website and publications everywhere are clamoring for an opinion column from me. Make George Clooney call me in the morning and say that he simply must buy the rights to Johnny Astronaut or I, An Actress immediately.
Or just give me another crappy test-writing job, really. I’m not that picky.
June 26th, 2008 at 4:40 pm
I thought I was the only one
June 26th, 2008 at 6:01 pm
You are. I just wrote this because I feel sorry for you.
June 27th, 2008 at 3:20 pm
I knew this gun would come in handy if I hung on to it long enough
June 27th, 2008 at 8:11 pm
Don’t tell I wrote because I don’t know you, I’m just a person at the ending of my careers who had the same kinds of struggles with picking what to do. So, as I’ve probably said before:
It is a REAL problem to be smart and talented because then you could do so many things you can’t pick one. This is true.
One way to decide and go in a direction is to decide: a. what you could be or are passionate about (most of us can’t), and…
…what would also work with the life you have and want.
b. Write the story-outline of your life from the age of 90 backward and see who you were and how it worked out and how you did it. This can work by shaking something loose.
c. Most of us start somewhere, work hard, and wind down some paths that accidentally take us to a place we’re ok about. If you like how that sounds, do it.
Don’t be afraid, you are loved.
June 28th, 2008 at 9:45 pm
When you find teh elusive awesome job, lemme know.