Today I felt like crying. It was a strange feeling.
I saw some work. Some mighty fine work. Advertising work. Real stuff. Stuff that gave me flashbacks of why I wanted to work in this industry in the first place.
I didn't even want to cry for myself. Well, not really, not directly anyway. But for those whose art suffers because they aren't where they want to be. For those whose passions are being unfulfilled. For those who know they can do better, but are being crushed into earning a check and not doing what they love. I felt that pain well up inside me like I haven't felt in a long time. It compelled me to my desk to write this down.
I've not been one to pity those who aren't happy doing what they're doing, but in this instance, I could immediately associate. Maybe "M" was right. Maybe I am such a generation Y'er that I feel like all aspects of my life should be so perfect and fulfilling that I walk around with a dipshit smile on my face all day.
Do I believe that my life should be great. Of fuckin' course. Who doesn't? But I have never sat idly by feeling that if I believed my life should be great, it would be. I've busted my hump. Made sacrifices to be where I am. The part that pains me is all the work I've put in has put me in a place that seems to be taking more than it is giving back.
I used to be a fire in the belly kind of guy, passionate about what I did. My work was good. It was damn good. It was clean, orderly. I got shit done. Nowadays, I feel like I'm phoning the this goddamn job in. Yea, I admit it. The work has suffered. I'm so inundated with work that in order to get anything done, it just has to get done now.
I just want to get it done. Get it checked off the list.
I've feel like I'm turning into the guy that I wanted to floor with a good right hook.
What is left to do but tough it out. There's part of me, the part that understands that my mother worked 5 years of her life, 7 days a week to keep me fed, clothed, schooled and happy, that wants to keep head down, my nose to the fuckin grindstone and work. Collect that check.
The other part of me, the part that understands that my mother did those things so that I wouldn't have to keep my head down or put my nose to a fuckin' headstone to keep my job, that part wants me stand up. Make noise. Stick it to the man, prove that this isn't just a job, this is my passion. And the things we're doing isn't cutting it. A check giveth, and it taketh away. (side note, I need to do my taxes tonight)
This is all of course just a rant. I know that the difference needs to be made right here where I'm sitting. Either get the business you wanna be working on, or get the fuck out. But nothing is ever so simple, so cut and dry. The politics of this whole game will fuckin raise me up to the sacrificial alter of the upper management gods as an example of one who couldn't pipe down and just be a good little lamb of the office gods, long before it dips my delicate little head in the baptismal waters of it's upper echelon. I don't want to play in your bullshit sandbox of double-talk and backtracking.
You want change in this game like you want pro-bono work. If there's gonna be any change, it'll end up in your tin cup. The real difference is gonna require a new captain, or a new ship.
And it will sail among a sea of our tears.
