bit of a funk
For the past few weeks I have been down.
Usually all it would take for me to get out of it would be a good night of drinking with good company, and the next day I would wake up feeling like shit, yet like a million bucks.
Back in the day I would have Marco or my Black Knights to commiserate with, but these days both are gone.
Marco is working some horrible, dead-end job in Des Moines with the Associated Press, and there has yet to be a decent showing for a BKE meeting in a while.
See, Marco was my longest friend at EIU, and we understood the pressures of journalism and would often put down many pitchers of cheap beer talking away our daily stresses of working at the Daily Eastern News.
The Black Knights of the Embarras, the veterans group of which I try to run, has been less than stellar the past few months.
Our motto is “Serving those who serve.” None of that has happened in a very long time. No one shows up to meetings, the excuses are always something about work or school. Fine, I understand. But many of the members neither work or take their studies too seriously.
We keep trying to come up with fundraisers, yet no one seems to want to do anything but have bar crawls. FINE. I get it, we are MORE than allowed to drink our memories away as often as we would like. I love bar crawls, I love organizing them (and I am actually not too shabby at doing that) but our group is about more than that. It has to be.
I used to drink every night with a couple of them, and rarely see them anymore, at meetings or the bar.
But the lack of a Marco and seemingly impending implosion of the BKE is not what is bugging me these days.
I have recently decided that I will not be pursuing a job as a photojournalist. (Marco, you win.)
With the horrible economy, and monthly lay offs within the failing newspaper job market, it just does not seem like there is room for me.
I am not a great photojournalist. I am miserable actually. It is just not within me, and I am not sure it ever was.
I have taken some real pretty pictures, and that is all. I have never been a Journalist while taking photos.
Taking photos on the sideline of a football game is great and all, and I love the sheer amount of people that I have met working as a photojournalist, but I really have been lying to myself for the past few years.
I just do not have the drive.
I quit.
What is funny about this decision is that I will be joining the ranks of both my brother and sister. Neither work in the field in which they studied.
So where do I go from here? What will I do?
I have a couple ideas of what to do when I graduate.
- move to North Dakota and work on an oil rig. I hear there are plenty of jobs for the taking our there.
- teach English in Korea. I absolutely loved when I lived in Korea, and I can speak some English.
- become a carpenter like jesus.
- move to the Yukon and become a hermit/trapper.
Any suggestions?
February 5th, 2009 at 9:33 pm
i don’t think you should just yet give up on the photog thing. i think before you do, you should work on something that you care about. like you said you haven’t actually done any journalistic work since you’ve been working at the den. you should pick up a project and see how it goes. if that doesn’t do it for you then you can always become my butler.
don’t forget i’m just the next town over. you can always make believe that i’m shorter and mexican.
i say go to korea no matter what you do. just be sure to bring your camera. don’t stay too long though. you can always fall back on making deposits at the sperm bank.
February 17th, 2009 at 2:51 pm
your sister and your brother are two different people, and although he studied photography for 3 years (effectively dropping out of photo school,) he is, actually, doing what he has any form of “degree” in. You fail to remember he has an ass-ociates in Business Management.
Your sister on the other hand. I guess this still counts as working with people.
I think you fail to remember that you have been quite successful as a photographer, because you are letting your current funk get the better of you.
You’re nearing graduation.
You are at the point in your life where you see friends who still have their head up their ass and it pisses you off.
You are also at the point where you are seeing old(er) friends start making “path of life” decisions, recognizing you haven’t, and it pisses you off.
Undoubtedly have some debt bugging the shit out of you.
Don’t know which way to go, but know you have to make a decision soon.
These things alone are enough to fuck someone day. Add that to these days and times and it’s no wonder.
Don’t fret. I’m pretty sure if you were to ask anyone 30+ about your dilemma here, that 90% would be able to say “been there done that.”
Granted you’ve got a different playing field than those before you, but, everyone you’re up against right now has the same field to play on.
You’re the child who had the balls to say, “Mom, Dad, I’m not 18 yet, but I’m joining the Army.” None of this “can I?” or “do you think I should?” shit. You just did it.
Think at all the political things you got involved in. But not that passive “yeah sure, I’ll sign your petition” shit. You stirred things up down there. You took charge, and when people were stuck in their “maybe we… maybe we” ruts, you said fuck it, “We’re doing it this way.” Weren’t you one of Easterns most influential people or something? You’ve got all those suits and that librarian, then there’s Eric, mohawk and all, 1/2 the age of the others.
I will say this. Now is NOT the time to fuck the edu. With things how they are today, you’ll need every little edge you can get, and a diploma in anything is better than one in nothing. Seriously. The more chances you have to show an employer that you started something and finished it, the better off you are.
Print news is failing. Digital media still needs images and words to put with them. Sure it’s tough now, but it wasn’t “easy” before.
Don’t stop because it’s too hard or too competitive if it’s what you really want to do. Stop because you wouldn’t miss it if you bagged you cameras for 24 months.
Ganas baby… with ganas you can do seemingly impossible things.