I was reminded of this poster tonight when I ran across an interview with its creator (Update: the original link seems to have died, here’s the Internet Archive’s cached version).
When did “it” (the concept for the poster) hit you?
Marilyn: I can remember exactly when “it” hit me. It was late one night after serving tables all afternoon and evening. I got home and I just laid down on the floor. I was exhausted and staring at the ceiling of my room thinking “what the fuck?” knowing that I would have to be back at the restaurant the next day and the day after and the day after…it just starts wearing you out, especially when you’re not interested in the work. […] With a 9-5 your time is completely strangled and sucked up.
[…] You go from pre-school to elementary school to middle school to high school and then off to college. Everyone is telling you how great you are going to be along the way like “Keep up the good work!”
Suddenly college is over and you’re pushed out into the meat-grinder (workforce) with no work experience and often times you just get ground up by employers who aren’t interested in you as a human being. All they care about is that you wear your name tag, smile, and work for next to nothing. It’s tricky.
I go through times like this every so often — generally, right around my birthday, when I roll another year forward without feeling like I’ve actually progressed anywhere of note. It hasn’t been hitting me as strongly this year as it has in the past (something I’m incredibly grateful for), but — without getting into much detail at all — recent frustrations at work (nothing in particular, just the usual day-to-day frustrations that come with any job) have stirred it up a touch.
Knowing myself and the way I work, chances are that it’ll fade away again before too terribly long (not entirely coincidentally, probably about the time things settle down on the work front again). Still…better to recognize that it’s there and work my way through it than just try to shove it onto my mental back burner where it can sit and simmer unattended until it boils over.
Current plans have Prairie and I moving in together in a few months, and as soon as possible afterwards, I’ll be taking a break from the 40-hour, 9-5 work week and putting my skinny butt back in school. Right now, I’m really looking forward to being able to do that, and start finding a way to give my brain something more challenging than glorified trained monkey work.
It won’t happen overnight, of course…but it’s long past time that I finally started down on that path. It’ll be nice when it happens, and it’s getting closer every day….
“Overture (from West Side Story)” by Green, Johnny/Orchestra from the album Movie Music: The Definitive Performances (1961, 4:40).
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