Dec. 06, 2001
When people ask what I do and I tell them I’m a writer, their response is to scrunch their nose and ask the same questions that everyone asks; how much does it pay, what do I write, and where did I get my degree. It always happens, without fail.
My answer is now always the same, “The pay varies, I write about every day real things in a way that you take a second look, and I have no degree as I’ve never stepped foot in a university.”
At this point, their eyes begin to squint and they look me up and down. They almost always want to challenge me because that’s not an answer they expected. They say, “You write about life? You’re what, 20?”
“No,” I’ll say with a wink, “I have far more years and experience than you think.”
Then there is always a moment of awkward silence until they ask, “Well, how do you write if you don’t have a degree?”
“Work doesn’t always require a degree,” I say. “Just effort.”
At this point the conversation usually ends. When people ask me those questions I know they’re looking for a certain response, and when they don’t get it, they become a bit defensive and try to put me on the spot but not validating what I say. It can be frustrating to say the least to not be taken seriously – either because of your profession, the way you look, or because of the life you’ve chosen.
When I encounter those sorts I just remind myself that they won’t help me anyway, so why bother explaining things or giving them the whole story.
I am by no means an accomplished and successful writer, and I still have far too much to learn than I can grasp right now, but at least I am out there doing. Perhaps not in the best way, or the easiest way, perhaps not as “professional writers with degrees and 50 years behind them” do, but I’m doing. I’m out there showing up each day trying to make a living at what I love. That, I think, is what is important – not how much I’ve taken home, how many degrees I have or a title that is cut and dry.
It’s funny, but when I was shopping today I heard a girl say, “I just graduated in May, with a degree in Creative Writing. There are no jobs out there for me at all so I have to work retail.”
When I heard that I thought to myself, “only if you want to.”