This page updated: 28/05/02
Well, here’s an interesting one. People nowadays still seem to be defined by what they do 7-8 hours in a weekday (that’s 20% of all the time available in a year), not who they are. I mean, if I was asked to define myself, I’d choose at least seven different factors present in my life before I’d mention temp.
I’m a singer, I’m in a long-term relationship (not married), I’m bisexual, I like messing about on computers and talking to my friends, I don’t drink and I’m a non-smoker, I love to dance and I don’t drive (I can, I just don’t, except on special occasions – Milton Keynes is a bit far to cycle to and sometimes even I can’t face the thought of National Express again), I recycle, I’m female, a writer, I like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, I don’t have any children, I’m British-Celtic, I’m a graduate, I vote Liberal Democrat, I’m middle-class, I’m a blonde and incidentally I do freelance typing and design work and I’m a temp.
Grrrrr.
Oh, I dunno – maybe it’s just that it’s easier to ask about a job/career/whatever than straight into the minutiae of what makes someone’s life when you’ve never met them before or you haven’t talked to them for ages. I’m sure I’m as guilty as anyone else, it’s just right now I guess I’m resentful. Bad Fay.
Soon I’ll be defining myself as a student again, I suppose, and will be on another career path/future definition (alternative therapist-in-training).
My whole and long-term problem with this way of defining people is that, for a long time, I haven’t really had any career-type ambitions. All my ambitions (badly-defined and vaguely formed as they were, still are) centred on either fuzzy things (I want to be happy, at least some of the time...) or pretty short-term (I want to be on time for this train). I resented this late-twentieth-century ideal that states clearly, categorically and without hope of compromise that to not have a career ambition/any clearly-defined personal development-focussed ambition was a sin tantamount to social treason. I’m a little more chilled about it now – people can have their ambitions and, as long as I earn enough to eat, pay the bills and indulge in various extra-curricular activities (A Cappella and Keith being chief among these), I’m reasonably content. However, I’m not happy temping (did you guess?), so getting myself trained to do something I may well enjoy seems a logical and pleasing conclusion.
We’ll just have to see how that goes... Watch this and other spaces nearby.
In case you’re interested, my various occupations have included (in no particular order): filing clerk, cleaner, paper collator, secretary, PA, administrator, freelance designer and typist, musician, DTP consultant, sandwich-maker, dogsbody, student, post-graduate, furniture removal, shop assistant, receptionist, switchboard-operator, data entry clerk, photograph developer’s assistant, runner. I’ve worked for engineers, builders, doctors, academics, social workers, charities, voluntary organisations, students, the Council, the NHS, universities, hospitals, the Students’ Union, a print shop, a bakery, consultants, idiots, fools and geniuses.
Pretty typical for a feckless graduate, wouldn’t you say?
This page updated: 28/05/02