Certifiably Certificationless

My general perception of the Peace Corps is that it was an experience of make-believe. To deal with the local pressures, lack of comfort, homesickness, wanderlust, confusion, anger, sadness, and generally just not knowing if you are over- or underwhelmed, you create a reality that you can deal with and live there for awhile. Some people are better at doing this than others. Actually, I almost think that people who do it too well should be taken directly off the plane and institutionalized. They've got some serious issues with reality. Still they tell you to stay and reinforce the idea of your 'commitment'. Good/successful/smart worthy people did it... you can too.

I left my New York life, which could have gone anywhere I wanted it to go, because I felt there was too much pretending. In New York, you can be as mental as you want to be as long as it's in some trendy, narcissistic, neurotic way... and you should preferably be really cute when you do it. You have brunch with people who can discuss world politics, art, literature; just don't mention any personal crisis or non-medicated emotion. It's bigger, better, faster, more... as Ani D says, the suits now own New York. Everyone claimed to be such an individual and open-minded - all the while wearing labels (Prada, Marxist) that gave them rank and file. Subscribe and belong. Judge and be judged. Good/successful/smart/worthy people do it... who are you to not?

Labels make me laugh. I wear Sears with Ann Taylor, Tiffany's with street jewelry. I'm a feminist who disagrees with a lot of what both feminists and women in general do, I'm a free-marketer who thinks that the biggest test to the theory is poverty... and that the theory doesn't always do so well. I'm the kind of joiner that inside people don't much care for. I'll embrace the parts of the status quo that work, but the rest... well, they need to go - or I do. I'll stretch an organization as much as it allows me to stretch it, but if administration and maintenance is what you are looking for, well, I am not your girl.

Anti-label, pro-individual, pro-mess, pro-growth, anti-stagnation. With these I look to join... I need a job. It took me some time to get out my resume and submit myself to the employment dating game. I need to follow the rules and to impress people I don't know and don't necessarily care about what they think of me. Good/successful/smart/worthy people do it... who am I to not?

I read job descriptions and am amazed by the requirements. People - ah, those MBAs! - have created measurement tools to try to assure people that they know what they are getting. The minimal requirements are several years in one particular and very tiny area (how far does this go? one ad looking for a barista required 'at least one year of microfoam experience'). Quantity... ah, those MBAs. I wonder though... if someone's only worked in one sector for all that time, how much creativity or flexibility can they have? How much ability to 'see the big picture' to make changes to actually create? Others require significant certifications. Acquire the signals that one is 'trained' and 'follows' a line of thought. Good/successful/smart/worthy people do it... monkeys do it too.

When I was a student, I never ran into problems with the material - regardless of the subject. My problem was generally that I'd get to the point where I knew what I wanted or was supposed to know... and then I just didn't feel the need to prove it to someone who proved it to someone who proved it to someone else. Disestablishmentarianism. I suppose it's something I've never quite gotten over - it's like a terminal professional illness.

Life is like high school in many ways - there's always another person playing teacher asking you to raise your hand, sit in the front, accept what it taught and get the proverbial 'A'. There's also the chance to sit in the back, raise your eyebrow and question authority and their 'truth'. I've done a bit of both and I can tell you I found a lot of successful people in the front. But the good, smart and worthy folks... well, I've met far more of them in the back. Plus, it's a lot more fun back there. Doesn't really solve the employment problem though, eh?

Hobbling forward

Reentering American society is a long, quiet and private war. I'm often asked what I do with my days and I'm routinely unsure how to answer. Some days I reach epiphanies that clearly steer my decisions, other days I do a lot of thinking with absolutely no conclusions drawn. I've been unemployed for nearly two months now. People keep asking if I've submitted my resume or found any good job listings... if I'm moving in the direction of honoring the Protestant Work Ethic like all 'good' people do. I confess, I think there is goodness in a hard day's work and I hope to return to it soon. It's just that... returning is exactly what I'm avoiding.

There's a trap we returnees are faced with: return to the comfort of what you knew or suck up more of the unknown, and possibly hardship, and do something different. The first of these options is easy to do. In addition to the experiences of the past, we have now served as 'good' people in a 'good' cause and, gosh darn people want to like us for it... and what's so wrong with being liked? The problem is that people don't flee a rewarding life to live in poverty for two years, no matter how open-hearted they are. Something's missing or, perhaps, too much is there and so departure - however temporary - seems like a good solution. Of course, this is until it's time to return when you know you've done little more than fight strange diseases in the name of procrastination.

As I tiptoe into my 30s with intense moisturizer in hand, I look around and see a lot of desperate romances. Of course these include actual intimate relationships, but it also includes attachments people have to other crutches in their lives... 'solutions.' There's a yearning to have The Answer and to look to someone or something else to give it. (I've had a draft of a long entry on addictions for some time... I need to finish it, because it really fits here.) Again, it's about ease - about being able to blame outside of oneself when things go awry, and they will. We all need to live our own truths - we can't depend upon others to provide those, or distract from their omnipresence.

I mention these desperate romances because, I don't want to fall into that trap. The trap of being something I'm not just because it's easy or because people like me for it. I didn't leave hoping for someone else to provide solutions for me and I do not return (I hope) wanting them either. I read my resume, on it's 274th draft, and think that I can and have done all those things. Then I think "do I want to?" ...and the resume sits there. I'm not sure that I do and not sure what to do next to provide for myself while I build something more real and closer to my personal truth. Love. Truth. Courage... hard to live up to.

I've been looking through employment listings like a desperate single woman with the Sunday Styles section (it's wedding listings, for those not in love with NYT.... and that's New York Times). I read about a prestigious consultancy firm with a large Chicago office that does a lot of international work. Like a lot of woman (and, dear lord, far too many gay men), I started to plan the future and to become seduced by the strongest venom of all: potential (as opposed to, oh, reality). I could picture a financially secure life where I went to work with talented and smart people, I traveled for work and for play and I live comfortably ever after. Comfort... not something I realistically ever really like. When thinking more about the position and attempting to deconstruct the fantasy I'd quickly created, I thought of my 10 year high school reunion. I missed part of the reunion and asked a friend about a former classmate of ours that I'd missed. She described the classmate as controlled and clipped... too polished to be real. Do I want to become that?

If asked how I see myself, I'd first attempt to wiggle out of a straight answer and then submit to the following: an observer and analyzer of human nature and interactions. That, unfortunately, is still all too vague. Should I "lead and coordinate cross-functional teams" until I realize what that specifically means to me... or bank on skills related to my drive and see where it goes? I struggle with wondering how to start what I love without nestling into the comforts of old patterns... how to lean on those old talents for support without reintroducing the crutch of yesteryear's answers into my life.

Apparently the plight of aid workers is universal

...and we all entered having no idea who the enemies were and where the struggles would be. More on that later. Until then, read this.

PS - I promise to not become one of those blogs that just links to other articles. Because that takes SO much talent. Um, yeah.

Eh...

Not much to say, but I've been posting daily, so I wanted to add a bit. All I'll add today is this:

this weekend, if you are near an English bookstore and haven't had the pleasure yet, pick up Persepolis, your favorite cup of coffee and prepare for a short but fantastic read. Spunk, smarts, originality. Good stuff.

And on a personal note: just feels fucking great to have access to books again. America, I love you. I love you so hard. Well...kinda.

What it feels like for a girl

This past week a semi-hero of mine died. Wendy Wasserstein - playwright, feminist, humorist - is no longer with us. Her fan base was quite dedicated even if the critics weren't always impressed. Personally, I loved her themes and her characters even if I thought she stopped short of delving deeper, delivering a slap where a hook was needed. Still, she showed that women writing about women needn't be resigned to a life serving on fringe festival panels and doing community theater, that there was a universal truth to the female human story and that one doesn't need to subscribe to the life of SUVs and marriage and child rearing in order to be fulfilled. She even put in the thought that perhaps it was better that we didn't.

I look around at the women leaders and thinkers we have out there and I'm really... well, sad. Sure the Maureen Dowd's can turn a phrase and the Martha's can help you find your inner domestic goddess and the Oprah's can help you streamline your emotions/ purchases/ thoughts/ life so that it's all rosy and fun, but we've come to placate more than we liberate and smooth more than we ruffle. My own days as a more active feminist involved posting quotes and stats all over lower Manhattan to get people to talk and think. It involved pointing out patriarchy and bullshit. It involved saying "I'm ok without you, foo". When I learned of Wendy's death I immediately thought of her plays, and then of their limitations. Still, she moved things forward and that act deserves to be recognized. She didn't stand in the safe sidelines critiquing others' works. She didn't steer from the complications of life in order to be happy, or as a way to market herself as The Grand Answer Holder. She was flawed, but there's absolutely nothing wrong with that.

A friend of mine spoofed my blog in an email to me once, riddling it with unanswerable questions. I do throw out a lot of those and I think Wendy did too. Call it feminism. See, I think that seeing one's self as the final answer is so incredibly infested with testosterone that I can't see the screen for my eyes rolling back so far. There are far too many blogs (written largely by men) dedicated to throwing out the person's opinion (however witless) about some grandiose issue. This person, this Cube Dweller, knows the answer though. Just ask. Or don't ask... he'll post anyway. This is not to say I find women's blogs to be a lot better. No, those are often sad songs about dieting woes, dating mishaps or (and this kills me) product endorsements. They don't encourage enlightenment or being a more open person or discuss the complications of their personal life. No, they encourage their readers to be more vain and image obsessed. A decade ago, in a room of feminists, if someone said "are you hot?" the group answer would be "who the fuck cares?" Now, even among the more vocal, educated and opinionated women out there, the answer would be "I sure hope so". Am I alone in finding this a problem?

Coming back from Peace Corps gave me a fresh take on American life. Once something of a political junkie, I admit that I now find caring a problem. Coming back and scanning the channels filled with political and business leaders, I immediately noted their sunken faces and deep lines and lifeless eyes and my first thought was "that's what your face looks like when you spend your life trying to control everything that isn't yours and avoid what is". Sure, it's a generalization, but it was my first reaction and it was as clear as could be. Everyone wears their history on their face. Some are just better mask makers than others. In my days in feminist meetings we had a "this is me, take it or leave it" attitude. I miss living in a world where people are like that, one where people are political about things that affect them directly, not in an attempt to manhandle the lives of others. Now, people just want to rule and be liked and are unabashedly willing to become whatever is needed to make that happen.

I realized while abroad that as much as the path to political or business success was alluring, the people I really respected were those that were out there living their lives and following their passions and just... leaving the mask at home. There are people who've done both, but I've met so very few of them. In a world where we drug every mental and physical problem, strive to exceed the Joneses and "present" ourselves to all but a select few, it was inspiring to know that there was one more person out there. One more person not afraid of the answers, so she didn't have to control them. She was more into the questions. In a world full of answers and answerers, I ask this: where have the maskless questioners gone?