Gig: Americans Talk About Their Jobs
Editors: John Bowe, Marisa Bowe, & Sabin Streeter
Published by: Three Rivers Press, 2001
The editors of this book have asked over 100 ordinary (and some not-so ordinary) people to discuss their jobs. The questions are removed, so you end up with 3- and 4-page monologues. Each person describes their working life in their own words. It’s a fascinating look at “The American story” and what the American workforce has to say about itself. "Gig" is a voyeuristic window on how people find value and self-worth. It offers insight into the jobs themselves and the passion people bring to their work.
Some of the diverse group of people who are interviewed:
- A cheerful and positive Wal-Mart greeter
- A crude crime scene cleaner
- Escorts, porn stars, & strippers
- A transvestite prostitute
- A web mistress
- A headhunter
- A construction manager
- A lawyer
- A steel worker
- An auto parts salesperson
- A corporate identity (logo) artist
- A clutter consultants
- Assembly workers
- Sports heroes
- A UPS worker
- A mega-producer
- A funeral home director
- People who appear to have a lot going for them
- Those who are just mailing it in
- People who have everything going against them
- Those who risk their lives
I bought this book three years ago when I was in the middle of a career change. Since age seven, I had prepared for a career in architecture. Now I found myself immobilized with a mental illness, relying on my husband and a disability paycheck that would soon run out.
Reading these intimate views of human lives in all their honest, revealing and surprising detail, I realized something. As bizarre as some of the jobs profiled in “Gig” are, few of the people interviewed complained about their bosses, insecurity, layoffs, dead-end jobs, bad pay, poor career choices, or annoying co-workers.
There is no prescription for the perfect job. And my self-worth was not defined by my job. Soon afterward, I stopped going to parties and introducing myself as an architect. And you know what? Nobody liked me any more or any less.
1 comment:
first - i would like to read this book. it sounds like i need it right now.
second - i went through a similar realization when i decided (after years of agony as you know) to quit grad school. i realized during a visit home that not everyone on the planet thinks a PhD is the only way to be happy. i saw that lots of people were Totally Satisfied even though they never went to college (gasp!). that realization helped give me confidence to leave something i too had been planning for and working towards for a long time.
and like you, when i stopped - no one treated me differently. if anything some people seemed jealous becuase they saw me as more 'free' than they were.
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