The Day Job.

Lately, I’ve started to feel like a fifties-era women’s college student with a new engagement ring (my book being the ring, in this case).  At least twice a week, I get this question:

“So, when are you quitting?”

Quitting what?  Why, my day job, of course!  That pesky means-to-an-end that every artist has to contend with, until that magical day when she becomes (ta-da!) PUBLISHED, and manna falls out of the sky, little birdies sew her a silk dress out of thin air, and there’s peace in the Middle East.

The answer:  I haven’t and I won’t.  But the reasons might surprise you.  Well, a couple of them won’t.  First, in addition to being a parttime lawyer, I’m a fulltime mom.  I can’t quit the latter job unless I want my next publication to be a prison diary.

And there’s the whole issue of money.  I hate to burst the bubble of all the would-be writers out there who still think publication contracts are delivered by Ed McMahon, but that’s not the way it works.  When you’re a new author, any publisher who invests in your work is taking a risk.  The advance you receive reflects that risk, and the current economy.  I’m lucky; my advance was good and my book is selling well for a memoir.  But still, if I was living solely on those funds, I would have died three days ago. 

Can the whole scrimping and scavenging and ”starving for your art” thing be done?  Yes.  But apart from really not enjoying that idea, I just don’t believe in it.  Here’s why I think all writers (especially new and aspiring ones) need a day job:             

You need a source of inspiration in order to be a good writer.  I’m aware that most people consider their day jobs to be anything but “inspiring.”  They’re a means to an end; something we do so we can get home and start living real life.  However, work life is a good muse because most people would really rather be elsewhere.  On any given day, in any given work environment (and yes, I’m counting parents who work in the home or whose children are their job — you have no IDEA how much drama you experience in a day as a fulltime parent), you witness the full range of human emotion: disappointment from a goal unsatisfied, conflict, jealousy, frustration, longing, gossip guilt.  You’re in the trenches.  In my experience, people are much more likely to dream big and dream loudly when they’re in the trenches than they are, say, when lazily sipping a pina colada, poolside.  And when you’re with them, you’re observing them.  You’re getting more and more skilled at describing how people interact on paper, and your writing is becoming more effective.  You have much to put on paper when you finally do get home. 

Being an artist doesn’t make you too good for a regular job, nor does it make you morally superior to those who have one.  I can’t tell you how angry it makes me to read the blogs of former day-jobbers, who muse things like “I just couldn’t ’sell out’ any more,” as if to imply that “that sort of paycheck-earning life is fine for all you ordinary everyday schleps out there, but I’m just too good for it.”  Worse, they write this as if it’s an honorable thing to say. 

I disagree.  There.  That’s about the most polite response I can make to this ridiculous, self-righteous attitude.  What’s scary is how pervasive it is. 

The implication seems to be that people who work for a living, and write and play on the side, are “wasting” their lives, “slaving” in a cubicle for someone else, etc.  Did these people never ask their grandpas for a dollar one day, only to get that precious “It will mean more to you if you earn it” talk?  My own grandafther worked five jobs when my dad was born, only one of which focused on his dream of opening an accounting business of his own.  Today, he’s over 80, riddled with painful arthritis, and spends most of his time on his acreage, bent over, harvesting corn in 100-degree Kentucky heat.  And he’s the happiest man I know.  He taught me that sacrificing, exerting, and enduring are, far from “wasting” life, some of the most satisfying aspects of it.  There’s no shame in working to feed something other than your own ego, nor in contributing to something that is bigger than your own world, even if it’s a child’s science fair project, or a spot on the production line of a big industrial manufacturer.  This is the stuff that will survive you.  Short-sited, self-centered efforts will not.               

I still have time to write.  Too many people believe that you can’t possibly work a day job and write in your free time.  You can.  I did.  It just takes patience, dedication, and plenty of discipline.  Writing a book is a choice.  It isn’t like the day job that you’re obligated to do, and that often makes it harder.  But if you can find just an extra hour a day over the course of a month (take lunch at your desk), that’s thirty plus hours worth of writing per month.  At a rate of a page per hour, you’ll have a book-length MS in less than a year. 

That said, my blogging hour’s now up and my son is calling.  Back to the day job.  Thank God for it.                

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