...reaction, thoughts, plans

taken from my sketchbook a few days after I was laid off, dated 09_0917

As I sit on my balcony, taking in the morning air and the day’s second green tea, the mid-morning walkers take their federally appointed ‘15’ around the block below me. It wasn’t too long ago that I was in their place, thankfully out of the office, striding with my coworkers, complaining about the idiocy that fills the office. This morning my companions are my iPod and a specimen of a praying mantis. The mantis has taken to the rangy basil I grow on my balcony. As I share the morning with her, I think of the things I have to do today: call the credit card company about a rogue charge, call the power company and get my bill paid, go to the unemployment office and apply for ‘government funding,’ and perhaps clean the bathroom—all tasks that neither interest me, nor need to get done today; a lethal combination for the unemployed and unmotivated.

I thought it would be harder. I thought I would be beside myself with anger and bitterness. I thought I would loathe the days of inactivity and be eager to hit the streets, looking for a new job. I thought I would mope and weep about: ‘whatever will I do?’ Instead I feel none of this. I feel relief. A disburdening. Opportunity. I’m surprised at my indifference towards the workplace. Had it been that bad in the office? Was I that burnt out about my job? Besides not having someplace to go, something to do during the day, I don’t seem to care that I’ve got no job. I don’t care that today I don’t have a fence elevation to create or grades to check for code compliance. No, I almost prefer it. I like that I can do the things that I’ve been wanting to do. And yet, now that I’ve had time to reflect, I am disappointed in myself. I’m not disappointed that I’ve lost my job, no, that was beyond my control, and lies completely on this failing economy. No, I’m disappointed that while I was employed, I let myself stray so far from myself and my dreams.

I was working at a job that, though I didn’t dislike it, I didn’t love it. Daily, I would recognize its flaws and be powerless to change them. It was an activity, a paycheck, something to pass the time, but in no way a dream come true. There was a time when I thought it was, but as work slowed down my tasks became increasingly dull. Perhaps that too can be blamed on the economy, perhaps not. I’m not pointing fingers. But I think, finally, I understand what my professors meant when they said ‘the real world.’

School is a magical place, especially so for designers. Everything in school is a design problem with an infinite number of solutions. There are few guidelines and little nay-saying. Words are ones of encouragement, of inspiration, of cultivation. Creativity is highly valued and greatly encouraged. As a result, the imagination of a designer is pure in school. It is untainted by code, or client, or cost. In the magical world of academia, the onus is on you, the sole designer, to accomplish what it is you want. There are few rules. In the real world—at least for graduates--you’re the low man on the totem pole and you accomplish what is given to you. But, more than that, more than having a smaller piece of the design pie, the real world confronts you with responsibilities that hold the designer back and rob you of the precious time you need to cultivate yourself, to feed that raging and hungry designer within.

Two years ago, I graduated school with a bouquet full of dream-filled balloons. Throughout school, as you find who you are, this bouquet fills and becomes as varied and assorted as you are. It becomes more defined, more tangible. When I graduated, I held my bouquet close. It floated just over my head, on a short leash. Gradually, however, as the real world weighed in and I assimilated into it, I let the leash out. While I was drinking my coffee and sitting in front my computer, I let the balloons out, one by one, until finally, they were but a spec in the sky, tethered by little more than a fragile thinning thread. That is my real world. It is what let out my balloons. It is what forced the indifference and laziness towards them. It is thinning thread, the distance between me and them, the jet stream that carries them.

So it is not a feeling of disappointment about losing a job that I feel. It is a feeling of disappointment in myself for letting my designer down. I’ve ignored that raging and hungry designer. And now that I’ve got time to look, and eyes to see, I can’t even see a good reason why I did. I pray my insight will nurture the now ragged and torn designer back to his usual self.