Uncertainties

I had an English teacher once who used to admonish us never to use the word "field" when talking about vocations. "Fields are for farming, for animals, for playing sports," she'd say. I don't recall now, but listening to her was probably where I first heard the phrase, "Hay is for horses." English teachers are amusing that way.

I'm having a rather laidback Saturday, just catching up on odds and ends, but not really accomplishing anything. I guess I needed that, after finishing some Very Important Things that were up against a Deadline, and then sitting around the office at work yesterday. I'm enjoying what I do now, I just wish I was getting paid for it, and not doing yet another internship. *sigh* I guess I'm running around in circles lately, trying to figure out where the hell it is I'm going from here. I know I miss teaching, but is going back to academia something I want to risk? Do I want to venture into a writing career, knowing that the competition is fierce and there's years and years of hard work ahead with no guaranteed payoff? Maybe I'll just try to figure out what an overeducated, underemployed deaf dude in his 30s can do with just a MA in History. Choices, choices... Things are so uncertain right now.

One thing I know I do well is advocate and agitate. It's easy to do so when there's so much that needs to be championed, and so much to be pissed off about. My latest source of hyperventilating, apoplexy-inducing rage is reading about how Enron screwed over California and the West Coast in general. I guess when it comes to blood-sucking soulless corporations, I shouldn't be surprised, but each new "revelation" angers me. Why is Ken Lay walking around free? Why isn't the media covering these types of stories more? Why aren't people flooding FERC, Congress, and the White House with complaints about getting shafted? Why isn't Der Governor spending his time trying to get a refund from these crooks, instead of sticking it to students, the elderly, and the poor? I know it seems like it's easier to do nothing; people protesting any sort of illegality or injustice would be just butting heads against the wall. But I don't think that's true. I think that people actually hold a lot more power than they realize, but in order to wield influence, participation is required. Whether working within the system or from the outside, it's a two-step process. The first step is to become educated about what's going on. The second step is doing something with the information you have. If no one listened to talk radio, or read newspapers, magazines, blogs, or bought books and pamphlets, the people who work in these industries would be unemployed. As consumers, people have economic power; this translates into a veneer of political power. But it's only as strong as people want it to be. I'm just just like Grandma Millie. I was living in NorCal, paying PG&E for my energy when Enron told the entire West Coast to bend over, take it, and like it.

But you know what? If Grandma Millie would take a moment to stop muttering, put in her falsies, and use them to take a really big chomp by screaming as loud as she can to anyone who'll listen, somebody's bound to feel the pressure. But it can't just be Grandma Millie. It's gotta be all of us.

So I figure while I'm working on the big task in front of me, what the hell to do with the rest of my life, I'll use my time and energy that's left over after career development to lend my voice to protesting the madness that passes for life in 21st-century America.