What a wonderful thing a national safety net is!
I've worked for myself, entrepreneur-like since I was in high school selling my artwork. First for friends and family for tattoos, then clothing designs, then business logos, and somewhere along the line started calling myself a graphic designer and communications consultant and off I went into business with a tax number and everything.
After my third kiddlet was born, it seemed like inconsistent hustling all the time was best left for those with fewer people asking you to buy things like cereal and toilet paper all the time. (My son still doesn't believe me when I tell him that most of the world doesn't use paper...and my daughters look at me like I'm going to join a grape juice cult when I joke about not buying it anymore) So, I got a real job. Nice job too with a safe, law abiding title. Administrator for a small non profit where I could bring my kids to work if I needed. Regular pay checks were great, regular office hours, meh.
So after a few years of that, it's done, burned by someone else, bad luck and circumstance, & as it goes, as the bean-head at the top of the staff responsibility ladder, I got the role of the goat.
Why me? boo hoo, sniff sniff, sigh.
Long walks in the forest with the dog reconsidering my life's purpose (uhhggg! )
Long baths with bubbles and pot.
Long pulls of whiskey from the bottle in the middle of the night when yoga wont put me back to sleep.
Long spooning sessions with the mint chocolate chip ice cream when no one is looking.
Why me? Boo hoo, sniff, sniff, sigh.
another day, another week.
BUT WAIT!
Then dawned the Golden Perk of Regular Work -- Employment Insurance!!
What concept! What a creative-I'll-do-it-on-my-own-time-I'm-an-artist! 's dream!
right now, I am receiving a little over half of what I was working, but I don't have to get up or dressed for it. I don't have to listen to imbeciles tell me again why they really will clean the yellow dobs off the toilet seat next time, or mold in the coffee pot? How did that get there? Or no smoking with the clients, really? Or meetings. aaaahhhhh....no more meetings....for awhile anyhow.
and beer for breakfast. and lunch. and a cocktail with a chocolate bar and snow peas dinner.
an pjs and lap tops in the sun for the afternoon!
Here's to taxes!
I've worked for myself, entrepreneur-like since I was in high school selling my artwork. First for friends and family for tattoos, then clothing designs, then business logos, and somewhere along the line started calling myself a graphic designer and communications consultant and off I went into business with a tax number and everything.
After my third kiddlet was born, it seemed like inconsistent hustling all the time was best left for those with fewer people asking you to buy things like cereal and toilet paper all the time. (My son still doesn't believe me when I tell him that most of the world doesn't use paper...and my daughters look at me like I'm going to join a grape juice cult when I joke about not buying it anymore) So, I got a real job. Nice job too with a safe, law abiding title. Administrator for a small non profit where I could bring my kids to work if I needed. Regular pay checks were great, regular office hours, meh.
So after a few years of that, it's done, burned by someone else, bad luck and circumstance, & as it goes, as the bean-head at the top of the staff responsibility ladder, I got the role of the goat.
Why me? boo hoo, sniff sniff, sigh.
Long walks in the forest with the dog reconsidering my life's purpose (uhhggg! )
Long baths with bubbles and pot.
Long pulls of whiskey from the bottle in the middle of the night when yoga wont put me back to sleep.
Long spooning sessions with the mint chocolate chip ice cream when no one is looking.
Why me? Boo hoo, sniff, sniff, sigh.
another day, another week.
BUT WAIT!
Then dawned the Golden Perk of Regular Work -- Employment Insurance!!
What concept! What a creative-I'll-do-it-on-my-own-time-I'm-an-artist! 's dream!
right now, I am receiving a little over half of what I was working, but I don't have to get up or dressed for it. I don't have to listen to imbeciles tell me again why they really will clean the yellow dobs off the toilet seat next time, or mold in the coffee pot? How did that get there? Or no smoking with the clients, really? Or meetings. aaaahhhhh....no more meetings....for awhile anyhow.
and beer for breakfast. and lunch. and a cocktail with a chocolate bar and snow peas dinner.
an pjs and lap tops in the sun for the afternoon!
Here's to taxes!
VIEW 4 of 4 COMMENTS
So yeah i thought the 'truth' thing was a reference to seeing the 'whole elephant' if you get what i mean. I think the whole bohemian thing is cool though & creates a really nice connection between you & your friends it's dope. I like tattoos with meaning!
Ps. Sounds like you have a cushy job, well played!
To paraphrase: The mice encounter a big thing near their pond. Each mouse goes, one per day, to investigate the new thing, and each describe the parts that they discover, strong like a pillar (leg), windy like a fan (ear), supple as a rope (tail) etc. The final mouse goes up one side and down the other, from the front to the back and on, until he finds each part that the others described and is able to summarize the moral and identity of the thing, that one must see more than the parts to deduce the whole...and, vwalla, the thing becomes an elephant.
The analogy of religions only seeing parts of the whole is pretty common too I bet...I've talked about one often (that I was told once by a Sik woman) to my Christian family over our regular friendly holiday dinner religious/polito debates. (my brother is a youth/relief pastor, but one of the cooler ones who occasionally wears a mohawk and/or bright coloured hair and places bass for their modern rock 'worship' services. And you were probably assuming I was the black sheep!)
The metaphor is of a mountain...that each person/community wakes up somewhere on the side of the mountain. God/understanding/enlightenment is at the top. Each of us/religious group must find their way up the mountain to find 'inner peace.' The way there is as unique as any mountain side...rivers to cross here and there, escarpments, inpenitrable forests, wolves and the like. So even if they've been to the top and back a few times, no one person/group can ever claim they have the blueprint to the 'right way up the mountain,' only their own way. Providing advice to other humans on how to get up the mountain must therefor be done very carefully, to empower each individual to be sensitive to the pitfalls of relying too much on the directions provided by any one source, and adapting these to their own circumstances and all.
thanks! I love my elephant all the more!