I've often thought of writing a humorous memoir of the various hourly occupations that I've had over the years, particularly those that I held before I started teaching. Having entered the labor force at the age of twelve, I have worked in a truly random assortment of positions and professions over the years, ranging from assistant repo man to unpaid professional script reader, and from telephone line technician with a journeyman's license to no-budget documentary filmmaker. I've kept copious notes over the years, just in case any of the details ever slip away from me. This is one of those things that I think would make for a funny and compelling book; I just question who the audience might be... you know, other than me. I do have some funny stories in there, though.
Who You Know
Applying for jobs can be a rather time-consuming and tedious process. At times, it can also be kind of soul-sucking. I recently spent the better part of the day completing all of the requirements for an online application, only to later find out that the job was never really open. Apparently, they already had someone lined up for the position, but they had to advertise it in order to create the appearance that they were considering other candidates.
This is not the first time that I have experienced this exact same thing, either, and that's just what I know of. Over the past few years, I've applied for over a hundred assistant professorship positions, most of which were out-of-state. Cumulatively, I was granted one telephone interview for a teaching job in one of my lesser areas of expertise, which, understandably, I did not get. However, there were also dozens of positions for which I really believed that I was a perfect fit, at least in my mind. As such, I can't help but wonder how many of these jobs were advertised simply to maintain the illusion of fairness and meritocracy. I'm sure that I'll never know.
I don't mean to sound cynical, as I do understand the reality of the situation, at least to some extent. In my penultimate year of graduate school, I took a seminar that basically spelled out the job market in academia. I suspect that if they offered this class at the beginning of the program, far more people would have dropped out. One not-so-fun fact that I gleaned from this course is that for every tenure-track position that I apply for, there are likely between one hundred and three hundred other perfectly qualified candidates, some of whom almost certainly "know somebody."
Admittedly, at the school where I had been teaching before the pandemic, I never even applied for that position. Somebody knew somebody who knew somebody who mentioned my name. After the interview, I was in. Compare that with all of these other jobs that I had applied for, each of which required its own distinct two-page cover letter, often with an accompanying statement of interest, inclusion, and/or expertise. Applying to these positions is typically an all-day process, sometimes more. It is also mentally and psychologically exhausting.
For what it's worth, I've also probably sent out over three hundred query letters for my screenplays and books over the years, only to find out that in most cases, they won't even open the envelope or email without a referral. Outside of contests, very little of my creative work has ever been read by anyone in its respective industry. I suspect that this is largely because I live in the middle of nowhere and don't know anybody in the right places. That's what I tell myself, anyway.
I don't mean to complain. Rather, I'm just sharing my experience in case it may have any value to anyone else. I may very well return to applying for teaching jobs now that the pandemic is drawing to a close, and I'll probably go back to sending out queries for the novel that I wrote last year, but I am also pursuing other avenues and trajectories... so if anybody out there happens to need a skilled writer, teacher and advanced scholar of media and culture who cooks extraordinarily well and plays about a dozen instruments by ear, please let me know.
I long to do something worthwhile.
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