And then I quit my job.
It wasn't like I stopped showing up, got fired, or walked out in protest because they didn't promote my friend Claudelle to shift manager even though everyone thought she totally deserved it more than that douche they brought in from Starbucks. I told my boss why I needed to leave, and she supported my decision. It was one of the most straightforward, honest conversations I've had in this brief corporate stint. Just in time for me to leave.
Telling people you're abandoning the 8 to 5 so you can "freelance," is, I'm discovering, a lot like explaining how you found gold rammed up the Easter Bunny's ass. The unspoken suspicion is that when you say "writer," you mean "heroin dealer," as that's almost certainly a more lucrative and socially acceptable profession.
I will probably make less money. I will have to buy my own health insurance. I will spend my mornings with my 2 1/2 year-old daughter instead of rotting away at a desk.
Time with one's little girl does not grow on trees.
When I was a kid, everyone told me that I could be "anything I wanted" – which is exactly what they told all the other children, but it left me saddled with the idea that whatever I did had to mean something. Important. So, with the world of possibility at my disposal, I accumulated achievements, fought for purpose and pretended to care, but in spite of all my scrambling toward the prize, I wasn't able to quiet the mounting frustration that somehow I was missing the point.
Refreshingly, this seems different.
It wasn't like I stopped showing up, got fired, or walked out in protest because they didn't promote my friend Claudelle to shift manager even though everyone thought she totally deserved it more than that douche they brought in from Starbucks. I told my boss why I needed to leave, and she supported my decision. It was one of the most straightforward, honest conversations I've had in this brief corporate stint. Just in time for me to leave.
Telling people you're abandoning the 8 to 5 so you can "freelance," is, I'm discovering, a lot like explaining how you found gold rammed up the Easter Bunny's ass. The unspoken suspicion is that when you say "writer," you mean "heroin dealer," as that's almost certainly a more lucrative and socially acceptable profession.
I will probably make less money. I will have to buy my own health insurance. I will spend my mornings with my 2 1/2 year-old daughter instead of rotting away at a desk.
Time with one's little girl does not grow on trees.
When I was a kid, everyone told me that I could be "anything I wanted" – which is exactly what they told all the other children, but it left me saddled with the idea that whatever I did had to mean something. Important. So, with the world of possibility at my disposal, I accumulated achievements, fought for purpose and pretended to care, but in spite of all my scrambling toward the prize, I wasn't able to quiet the mounting frustration that somehow I was missing the point.
Refreshingly, this seems different.
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posted by Jonathon Morgan at 8:45 AM
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