He not only assumes the gender, but he also calls the individual "trash", instead of a sanitation systems engineer being exploited this evil, rich white boomer!
Great essay and thanks for the book references. I ordered Pieper right away anxious that I’m 25 yrs too late but doing it anyway. Your missive has made me think of how others have often viewed or reacted to my “work” over the past 25+ years. I’ve been surviving as a traditional artist -- primarily portraits but also landscape, figural, still life -- and as an art teacher. In reality, both are part-time pursuits because neither alone would be “making a living” by any ordinary standards (in the World of Work). The reaction I usually get when I answer the “what do you do?” question is, first, a kind of blank stare, as if they have no idea how to react and are searching for something to say since they have never heard of an artist who didn’t (in their minds) present as a drug-addled degenerate or a mincing fop. After which they say, “Oh, that must be fun,” which is the same as saying, “Oh, you are not really working -- because art is what otherwise normal people do as a hobby -- therefore it is easy and therefore it is leisure and therefore it must be fun.”
Anyway, your essay has made me look back on that with a more understanding (not more forgiving) eye. Some of the concepts of culture and our place in it that you speak of -- and which seem to be well demonstrated in Pieper’s book, are things that I have, frankly, been wrestling with understanding or even recognizing for years now, but have not been able to articulate even to myself until -- well -- today. So, again, thanks for this.
Thanks for this. I've been working for myself at home for almost 20 years now after leaving corporate America, first as a web developer (which I loved, but that is now coming to end) and now as writer, developer of curriculum for homeschoolers mainly. Love this too. There are few things better than being able to make a living doing something you love...and the commute is great!
Work that makes you happy isn't really work. You know that it isn't when someone says (of your happy work) "Wow, that must have been a lot of work" and then you think how lucky you are to have someone appreciate something that you love to do!
Excellent review!
He not only assumes the gender, but he also calls the individual "trash", instead of a sanitation systems engineer being exploited this evil, rich white boomer!
I know because corporate media whores told me so.
Great essay and thanks for the book references. I ordered Pieper right away anxious that I’m 25 yrs too late but doing it anyway. Your missive has made me think of how others have often viewed or reacted to my “work” over the past 25+ years. I’ve been surviving as a traditional artist -- primarily portraits but also landscape, figural, still life -- and as an art teacher. In reality, both are part-time pursuits because neither alone would be “making a living” by any ordinary standards (in the World of Work). The reaction I usually get when I answer the “what do you do?” question is, first, a kind of blank stare, as if they have no idea how to react and are searching for something to say since they have never heard of an artist who didn’t (in their minds) present as a drug-addled degenerate or a mincing fop. After which they say, “Oh, that must be fun,” which is the same as saying, “Oh, you are not really working -- because art is what otherwise normal people do as a hobby -- therefore it is easy and therefore it is leisure and therefore it must be fun.”
Anyway, your essay has made me look back on that with a more understanding (not more forgiving) eye. Some of the concepts of culture and our place in it that you speak of -- and which seem to be well demonstrated in Pieper’s book, are things that I have, frankly, been wrestling with understanding or even recognizing for years now, but have not been able to articulate even to myself until -- well -- today. So, again, thanks for this.
Back to my quest...
Thanks for this. I've been working for myself at home for almost 20 years now after leaving corporate America, first as a web developer (which I loved, but that is now coming to end) and now as writer, developer of curriculum for homeschoolers mainly. Love this too. There are few things better than being able to make a living doing something you love...and the commute is great!
Work that makes you happy isn't really work. You know that it isn't when someone says (of your happy work) "Wow, that must have been a lot of work" and then you think how lucky you are to have someone appreciate something that you love to do!