Friends,
I used to dream about what I would do for a living. Long before viewers fell in love with the 60s misogyny and lung cancer glamorized by Mad Men, I wanted to be a copywriter. I wanted to sit in a bullpen with a group of writers to craft the perfect pitch and build marketing campaigns that resonate. My goal was to use language to convince people to reward my clients with their business. Pretty straightforward.
When I first cultivated this dream, I was monkeying around with 8-bit computers, but I really thought my future looked like a family in New Rochelle, New York.
Some of that happened. Most of it didn’t.
I married the sweet girl. That part worked great. What didn’t was the professional writer part. During my hiatus from this bloggy trash fire, I worked for a global publisher, a county, and a medical device manufacturer. And imagine how surprised I was to find myself eventually working at a university. But not writing. I’ve been spending my time trying to convince users—mostly callers—that they’re not dumb. That the computer problems they’re facing aren’t their fault.
In some of these places, I’ve spent enough time to make friends. Some of these places have only served as waypoints on the way to the next thing. Some didn’t know what the job should be. And some of these places made the job as ridiculous as possible. Couldn’t get hired for the job I dreamt about though, so I’m just going to keep doing this.
Right?
Your pal,
– bob