A friend who was recently laid off from his job and I were discussing how our job searches were going. He said he has a few things in the hopper. The best I could say: "It's going." That day I'd applied for one of those sign-of-the-times jobs, as a part-time, substitute technician at the local library. After I expressed doubt about why I was even applying, he said (and I paraphrase), "Well, you've been out of it for a while, so you might have to take what you can get."
Ouch.
Now, we've known each for almost sixteen years, and I'm sure he didn't mean for it to come out like that. Except that it did come out like that.
Maybe he knows something about the job market and the workplace that I don't know. After all, I have been "out of it" for ten years.
Then again, he knows me. He knows I'm smart and capable. It's not like I'm some sixteen-year-old applying for her first job at Taco Bell. I've worked since I was eleven (babysitting for neighbor kids). I have a bachelor's degree. I've got some skill-dazzles.
An employment coach recently told me that a lot of employers hesitate to hire people with resume gaps because they assume they're going to have to teach them everything and hold their hands all the time.
Is Bobby Riggs writing the human resources manuals here? Methinks it is not I who needs updating.
Number one, it's not like I'm Rip Van Winkle. I've been awake, though often sleep-deprived, and yes, even sentient, during the last decade. Google has practically idiot-proofed the Blogger program I'm using at this moment. But for cryin' out loud, is it necessary for me to point out that I'm using Blogger at this moment?
Number two, don't most jobs, apart from the President's, have training programs?
Number three, I can learn, from training programs, and also with the desire to get and keep and improve at a job and just plain old curiosity.
And number four, I dare anyone to try staying home alone with a toddler. Talk about being an independent contractor. With most of the other women my age at work, I often felt like a pioneer woman, out there alone on the prairie. High lonesome winds. Had to invent our own fun and stay sane, and yes, sentient, at the same time. Cookin' up a new batch of play dough. Pitchin' a tent over the dining room table and playin' Indians. Not a hint of adult conversation in sight. Years before I talked in a complete sentence.
Or at least until my husband got home from work.
Surely there are hiring supervisors out there who can put aside their prejudices about resume gaps and the intellectual capacity of stay-at-home moms.
I'm counting on it.
Monday, June 28, 2010
Monday, June 21, 2010
Just my opinion, ma'am
When I wrote for my high school newspaper, I entered several journalism contests in the editorial category. Most of the time the best I did was to get a honorable mention, but my last contest my senior year I actually won for my editorial on busing. Remember that issue? Serendipity played a role in my victory, because a couple of weeks before that contest I had been listening to a talk show on KPFK, the National Public Radio affiliate in Los Angeles. The topic: busing.
The contest organizers never told me that I won because my editorial exhaustively covered the issue, just as KPFK had that day. Of course I had an opinion--it wouldn't have been an editorial otherwise. As if I were debating, I discussed the pros and cons and explained why the position I took was the correct course of action. I was shooting for a well-reasoned, earned opinion that was based on my interpretation of the facts.
As a high school senior, my mother was fond of telling me that I thought I knew everything. (The fact that I didn't was going to become abundantly clear to me over the next few years.) But the one thing I knew even as a seventeen-year-old was that editorials are distinct from news, a fact that escapes news producers and consumers alike.
Nowadays it's fashionable for editorialists to write copy that tears down their opponents' point of view without ever explicitly stating their own solutions. Charles Krauthammer's article in the local paper entitled "Obama still dreamer in chief" is a great example of this kind of writing. While he doesn't hesitate to describe President Obama as "fatuous" and otherwise unmoored from reality, never once does Mr. Krauthammer come right out and say, "Oil producers ought to drill wherever and whenever they can, and nothing, not even the worst oil spill in U.S. history, ought to disrupt the flow of oil to consumers. And there's no need to think of 50 years from now, after that supply of oil is depleted and other spills of this magnitude have occurred. Drill, baby, drill!"
If this is what he had written, the best I could say is that at least he was intellectually honest.
There are no news sources that are unbiased, primarily because there is no one alive who is unbiased. The closest thing to an unbiased news source is the Christian Science Monitor. I haven't followed its coverage of the health care debate, but I would expect a bias against medical technology. FOX News' "Fair and Balanced" moniker: baloney paid for with Rupert Murdoch's gazillions. Fair and Balanced, compared with what?
Rush and O'Reilly aren't the only ones who are confusing opinion for fact and entertainment for news. I'm as big a fan of "The Daily Show" and "The Colbert Report" as the next guy. For the record, I think Stewart and Colbert know where the lines are. They wouldn't be performing on Comedy Central if they didn't. The trouble is, some of their viewers don't get it. It scares me when I hear people say they get their news from "The Daily Show." I take Jon Stewart at his word--this is fake news, and he's a fake news anchor. The fun is in the comic perspective he takes, completely purposefully, unlike Glenn Beck's deadly serious yet unintentionally ridiculous diatribes. Stewart and Colbert's zingers routinely hit the mark. Sometimes they do it better than the "real" news anchors. Still, both shows are comedy first, and opinion second, with commentary on current events mixed in.
If you want reassurance that there are still some people in the news biz who know how to do their jobs, I recommend "The News Hour with Jim Lehrer." on PBS. I am always reassured, about both the state of the journalism business and the world, when I watch Lehrer's show. The guests, who are experts on the issues, are often sitting beside each other, and frequently, in the studio with the interviewer. That lends itself to more reasoned, civil discourse. It's really difficult, unless you're congenitally ill-mannered, to personally attack someone when they're breathing the same air.
The contest organizers never told me that I won because my editorial exhaustively covered the issue, just as KPFK had that day. Of course I had an opinion--it wouldn't have been an editorial otherwise. As if I were debating, I discussed the pros and cons and explained why the position I took was the correct course of action. I was shooting for a well-reasoned, earned opinion that was based on my interpretation of the facts.
As a high school senior, my mother was fond of telling me that I thought I knew everything. (The fact that I didn't was going to become abundantly clear to me over the next few years.) But the one thing I knew even as a seventeen-year-old was that editorials are distinct from news, a fact that escapes news producers and consumers alike.
Nowadays it's fashionable for editorialists to write copy that tears down their opponents' point of view without ever explicitly stating their own solutions. Charles Krauthammer's article in the local paper entitled "Obama still dreamer in chief" is a great example of this kind of writing. While he doesn't hesitate to describe President Obama as "fatuous" and otherwise unmoored from reality, never once does Mr. Krauthammer come right out and say, "Oil producers ought to drill wherever and whenever they can, and nothing, not even the worst oil spill in U.S. history, ought to disrupt the flow of oil to consumers. And there's no need to think of 50 years from now, after that supply of oil is depleted and other spills of this magnitude have occurred. Drill, baby, drill!"
If this is what he had written, the best I could say is that at least he was intellectually honest.
There are no news sources that are unbiased, primarily because there is no one alive who is unbiased. The closest thing to an unbiased news source is the Christian Science Monitor. I haven't followed its coverage of the health care debate, but I would expect a bias against medical technology. FOX News' "Fair and Balanced" moniker: baloney paid for with Rupert Murdoch's gazillions. Fair and Balanced, compared with what?
Rush and O'Reilly aren't the only ones who are confusing opinion for fact and entertainment for news. I'm as big a fan of "The Daily Show" and "The Colbert Report" as the next guy. For the record, I think Stewart and Colbert know where the lines are. They wouldn't be performing on Comedy Central if they didn't. The trouble is, some of their viewers don't get it. It scares me when I hear people say they get their news from "The Daily Show." I take Jon Stewart at his word--this is fake news, and he's a fake news anchor. The fun is in the comic perspective he takes, completely purposefully, unlike Glenn Beck's deadly serious yet unintentionally ridiculous diatribes. Stewart and Colbert's zingers routinely hit the mark. Sometimes they do it better than the "real" news anchors. Still, both shows are comedy first, and opinion second, with commentary on current events mixed in.
If you want reassurance that there are still some people in the news biz who know how to do their jobs, I recommend "The News Hour with Jim Lehrer." on PBS. I am always reassured, about both the state of the journalism business and the world, when I watch Lehrer's show. The guests, who are experts on the issues, are often sitting beside each other, and frequently, in the studio with the interviewer. That lends itself to more reasoned, civil discourse. It's really difficult, unless you're congenitally ill-mannered, to personally attack someone when they're breathing the same air.
Monday, June 14, 2010
Keeping Hope Alive
I've been thinking about the state of the world more than usual because I'm sending our 18-year-old out there. A world in political, economic, spiritual and environmental turmoil. When I was 18, I had high hopes that I could help make the world a better place. The fact that the world is in such a mess isn't all my fault, of course. But dang it--I wish my sons were inheriting better circumstances.
Get over it, some might say. The world is always in a mess. It's a ruthless old place, and our kids better be prepared to deal with it. The prescription: grab up as many resources as you can to keep you and yours safe. That looks like driving around town in a Humvee, living in a gated community, attending a megachurch and sending your kids to private school, or better yet, homeschooling them.
My idealism has waned and waxed. As I've faced personal and professional challenges, I might have been convinced that yes, indeed, the world is a tough place and I'd better put up my dukes. But along the way I've also happened onto more than my fair share of truth and beauty: the births of my babies, the outpouring of sunshine, birdsong, the kindness of strangers, rain in the desert, the blazing beauty of trees in autumn, the bounty of summer vegetable gardens, the shy presence of deer, startling displays of talent, and the healing of disease.
I'm going to share a secret for preserving hope in a world with a serious shortage of the stuff: I'm always on the lookout for more of this sweetness, the kind no man makes, that is there for us as surely as dew on the lilies of the field. An outpouring that usually appears at those moments when we most expect it.
In the 80s I worked in the prep room of the Swan/Heavenly Goose Restaurant in downtown Santa Cruz (later leveled by the 1989 earthquake). I was chopping vegetables below a barred window facing onto Front Street. Front Street was a rough place by Santa Cruz standards, and nearly all the businesses along there had installed bars on their windows. A transient walking by stopped to stare at me.
"Lady," he said, "you're in prison."
I was too stunned to speak, so it was up to my co-worker to respond. Franco had more life experience, and it didn't hurt that he'd grown up in Brooklyn.
"Hey, pal," he said, waving his cleaver, "the bars work both ways."
No doubt Franco would have said he was just a street-smart guy chasing off the riff raff. His words have stuck with me because, like Springsteen's in my previous post, they're so true. The bars work both ways. On the one hand the bars kept the business safe from thieves and vandals. On the other hand there are people with electronic security systems in their homes who are imprisoned by their fears about all that could threaten them. Their vigilance is focused on filtering out the bad. But if the filter's too fine, the good, the truth and beauty, can't make it through, either.
Creating a better world is still a good idea, even if pursuing it too often feels like sandbagging against a rapidly rising stream. In my experience, cultivating eyes and hearts to expect truth and beauty is a recipe for lasting security.
Here's Emily Dickinson saying it poetically:
Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul,
And sings the tune without the words,
And never stops at all,
And sweetest in the gale is heard;
And sore must be the storm
That could abash the little bird
That kept so many warm.
I've heard it in the chilliest land
And on the strangest sea;
Yet, never, in extremity,
It asked a crumb of me.
Get over it, some might say. The world is always in a mess. It's a ruthless old place, and our kids better be prepared to deal with it. The prescription: grab up as many resources as you can to keep you and yours safe. That looks like driving around town in a Humvee, living in a gated community, attending a megachurch and sending your kids to private school, or better yet, homeschooling them.
My idealism has waned and waxed. As I've faced personal and professional challenges, I might have been convinced that yes, indeed, the world is a tough place and I'd better put up my dukes. But along the way I've also happened onto more than my fair share of truth and beauty: the births of my babies, the outpouring of sunshine, birdsong, the kindness of strangers, rain in the desert, the blazing beauty of trees in autumn, the bounty of summer vegetable gardens, the shy presence of deer, startling displays of talent, and the healing of disease.
I'm going to share a secret for preserving hope in a world with a serious shortage of the stuff: I'm always on the lookout for more of this sweetness, the kind no man makes, that is there for us as surely as dew on the lilies of the field. An outpouring that usually appears at those moments when we most expect it.
In the 80s I worked in the prep room of the Swan/Heavenly Goose Restaurant in downtown Santa Cruz (later leveled by the 1989 earthquake). I was chopping vegetables below a barred window facing onto Front Street. Front Street was a rough place by Santa Cruz standards, and nearly all the businesses along there had installed bars on their windows. A transient walking by stopped to stare at me.
"Lady," he said, "you're in prison."
I was too stunned to speak, so it was up to my co-worker to respond. Franco had more life experience, and it didn't hurt that he'd grown up in Brooklyn.
"Hey, pal," he said, waving his cleaver, "the bars work both ways."
No doubt Franco would have said he was just a street-smart guy chasing off the riff raff. His words have stuck with me because, like Springsteen's in my previous post, they're so true. The bars work both ways. On the one hand the bars kept the business safe from thieves and vandals. On the other hand there are people with electronic security systems in their homes who are imprisoned by their fears about all that could threaten them. Their vigilance is focused on filtering out the bad. But if the filter's too fine, the good, the truth and beauty, can't make it through, either.
Creating a better world is still a good idea, even if pursuing it too often feels like sandbagging against a rapidly rising stream. In my experience, cultivating eyes and hearts to expect truth and beauty is a recipe for lasting security.
Here's Emily Dickinson saying it poetically:
Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul,
And sings the tune without the words,
And never stops at all,
And sweetest in the gale is heard;
And sore must be the storm
That could abash the little bird
That kept so many warm.
I've heard it in the chilliest land
And on the strangest sea;
Yet, never, in extremity,
It asked a crumb of me.
Friday, June 11, 2010
Taking Inventory
In an interview some years ago, Bruce Springsteen said something to the effect, "I may not be the best singer, I may not be the best guitar player, I may not even be the best performer. But when you put together all the things I do, I got something."
His words have stuck in my mind because they're so true. As I search for employment, I'm constantly thinking about all the things I do and matching them with job descriptions. I don't sing, I don't play guitar, and the idea of performing in front of a crowd gives me the heebie-jeebies. But I got something.
There's a lot of talk in employment circles about "monetizing experience." Along those lines, my friend Alaya suggested I start putting together a little package of all the things I do--especially the ones I most love to do. When I start listing all the things I do, have done and would like to do (and this last one may be the most important), it's a long list that at cursory glance doesn't necessarily seem to have any connection to one another. Editor/writer. Wild animal care volunteer. Caterer. Sound system operator. Hospitality host. Event planner. Chef. Amateur spiritual director. Interviewer. Nonprofit fundraiser. Active listener. Yoga practitioner.
My friend Kathryn looked at one iteration of my resume and said very sweetly and to the point, "I don't know how to get my arms around this." Read: the average human resources person would throw my resume in the "Flake" category. I'm sure there is one.
But with a little imagination and a lot of insider knowledge, there are some themes. Excellent overall communication skills. Nurturing and nourishing skills. Planning and management abilities. An interest in lifelong learning. A versatility very much needed in today's workplaces, where employees are often fulfilling more than one job description.
Try it yourself. It can't hurt. At the very least it clarifies my presentation and sharpens my discernment about where I would be most effective.
His words have stuck in my mind because they're so true. As I search for employment, I'm constantly thinking about all the things I do and matching them with job descriptions. I don't sing, I don't play guitar, and the idea of performing in front of a crowd gives me the heebie-jeebies. But I got something.
There's a lot of talk in employment circles about "monetizing experience." Along those lines, my friend Alaya suggested I start putting together a little package of all the things I do--especially the ones I most love to do. When I start listing all the things I do, have done and would like to do (and this last one may be the most important), it's a long list that at cursory glance doesn't necessarily seem to have any connection to one another. Editor/writer. Wild animal care volunteer. Caterer. Sound system operator. Hospitality host. Event planner. Chef. Amateur spiritual director. Interviewer. Nonprofit fundraiser. Active listener. Yoga practitioner.
My friend Kathryn looked at one iteration of my resume and said very sweetly and to the point, "I don't know how to get my arms around this." Read: the average human resources person would throw my resume in the "Flake" category. I'm sure there is one.
But with a little imagination and a lot of insider knowledge, there are some themes. Excellent overall communication skills. Nurturing and nourishing skills. Planning and management abilities. An interest in lifelong learning. A versatility very much needed in today's workplaces, where employees are often fulfilling more than one job description.
Try it yourself. It can't hurt. At the very least it clarifies my presentation and sharpens my discernment about where I would be most effective.
Wednesday, June 9, 2010
1-800-USA-GOVT
I was just listening to Colorado Public Radio's summer pledge drive, or rather tuning it out until "Talk of the Nation" comes back on. I have that right. I've pledged to public radio since I was a teenager.
The pledge drive made me start thinking that the government might make its citizens really happy to pay taxes instead of listening to constant appeals like: "If you like the Social Security program, please run to your phone right now and pledge. Pledges start at $60 annually . . ." or "For the cost of one grande latte a day, you can ensure that the government will continue to cover the costs of national defense."
In other news: Have you heard the one about BP's claim that the oil it's reclaiming from the spill will pay for the Gulf's clean-up?
Really?
Reminds me of when Bush/Cheney said the U.S. would pay for the Iraq War with oil revenue from Iraq's oil fields.
Really?
I thought the U.S. invaded Iraq, meaning it was on this country's dime. I support National Public Radio, but I was always against the Iraq war. That oil wasn't ours to claim.
BP and Bush are and were full of bull-bleep.
The pledge drive made me start thinking that the government might make its citizens really happy to pay taxes instead of listening to constant appeals like: "If you like the Social Security program, please run to your phone right now and pledge. Pledges start at $60 annually . . ." or "For the cost of one grande latte a day, you can ensure that the government will continue to cover the costs of national defense."
In other news: Have you heard the one about BP's claim that the oil it's reclaiming from the spill will pay for the Gulf's clean-up?
Really?
Reminds me of when Bush/Cheney said the U.S. would pay for the Iraq War with oil revenue from Iraq's oil fields.
Really?
I thought the U.S. invaded Iraq, meaning it was on this country's dime. I support National Public Radio, but I was always against the Iraq war. That oil wasn't ours to claim.
BP and Bush are and were full of bull-bleep.
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
My Guilty Pleasure
I admit it--I'm a hardcore "Fresh Air with Terry Gross" junkie. As someone who has interviewed people for a living, I say with all confidence that Terry is the best in the business. She really knows how to get people talking. I think it's because she's really well-prepared, and that includes being prepared to follow up on the surprising responses she elicits from her guests. Being a really good listener doesn't hurt her, either.
My favorite Fresh Air interviews are numerous--the one with Borat/Sasha Baron Cohen was especially naughty--but I have to say I enjoy the ones with John Waters, the director of "Hairspray" and "Pink Flamingos." He was on today's show http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=127238420.
Full disclosure--I can't stand his movies. I walked out of "Pink Flamingos" when I saw it at the Nuart Theater in West L.A. shortly after it came out. So when I heard Terry interview him about five years ago or so, I experienced some serious cognitive dissonance. I expected Waters to be just like his movies--irreverent to the point of rudeness, creepy, bizarre. That he was articulate, polite and unabashedly exactly who he is was a pleasant surprise. I think Quentin Tarantino might very well be riffing off John Waters. Neither director is afraid to show their audiences the unedited content of their imaginations. As an aspiring writer, I could stand to riff off Waters and Tarantino.
My favorite Fresh Air interviews are numerous--the one with Borat/Sasha Baron Cohen was especially naughty--but I have to say I enjoy the ones with John Waters, the director of "Hairspray" and "Pink Flamingos." He was on today's show http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=127238420.
Full disclosure--I can't stand his movies. I walked out of "Pink Flamingos" when I saw it at the Nuart Theater in West L.A. shortly after it came out. So when I heard Terry interview him about five years ago or so, I experienced some serious cognitive dissonance. I expected Waters to be just like his movies--irreverent to the point of rudeness, creepy, bizarre. That he was articulate, polite and unabashedly exactly who he is was a pleasant surprise. I think Quentin Tarantino might very well be riffing off John Waters. Neither director is afraid to show their audiences the unedited content of their imaginations. As an aspiring writer, I could stand to riff off Waters and Tarantino.
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