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Blogs by Shirley Ann Parker
A Dream Scrambling to Survive 1/15/2006 1:01:43 PM
For creative people, it has always been difficult to earn enough money to live, let alone save any of it. Most of us, as creative people, are scrambling to earn a living, or worse these days, trying to put money away for looming retirement. For creative people, it has always been difficult to earn enough money to live, let alone save any of it. Today's various forms of digital media have not made it much easier to pursue work that is truly satisfying, though the pay can be better for those with technical skills.
In spite of that, employers will still pay close to bottom dollar for skilled workers, as long as they can get away with it. Overall, writers and artists end up temporarily resigned to work that more or less pays the bills, while we do our creative "real work" on the side. I'm now temporarily stuck in such a substitute employment situation. While I did not voluntarily put myself in this place, I am the only one who can drive myself out of this frustration.
Transferring within a corporation is nowhere near as simple as it should be. I was promised a transfer "within a year" at my first US corporation over 35 years ago. It didn't happen, and I ended up walking away. It looks as though the same thing is about to happen again.
I envy the determination, financial know-how, and contacts of a co-worker. He has been expending an enormous amount of personal time and energy into launching a publishing company this past year. Nightmare dealings with printers attempting to rip him off, at home and off-shore, have been a steep learning curve.
Finally, he has sufficient product to get his company's titles into the reading and other programs he has been pursuing. Soon, he will be able to return to his first dream of being a writer. Getting where we want to be can happen for all of us, but we have to drive.
