You can learn almost anything in school. There’s literally an institution or class for almost any skill. You want to learn to bake? Repair a car or HVAC system? Write a novel? (Notice I didn’t say a good book.) Diagnose diseases? Sue the fertility clinic? There’s a school for that.
But there’s not one that teaches you how to be unemployed or the magic formula for then becoming NOT that way again while maintaining your good humor. You have to figure that shit out on your own.
It’s hard to tell people “I’m unemployed right now” and feel like an adult, because we identify ourselves and each other so closely with what we do to earn money. Asked “what are you?” most people’s reaction is to answer with their job title or place of employment. Even saying “I’m a student” if you have no other job is laced with respectability. Almost nobody answers this question with “you know, I’m a Trekkie, but when the new movies are coming out, I like Star Wars, too” or “a knitter, as long as the JoAnn’s here doesn’t close down, knock on wood.”
My first bout of unemployment was when I resigned a job to go to Hong Kong and Macau for five weeks with the Rotary on a special scholarship program it sponsored for working adults (I like that you also see the irony in that; we’re going to be good friends). Normally I will pass up a lot of personal opportunities in favor of being loyal to my employer, but I was in a situation where despite hiring me to do a specific thing, my boss really didn’t appreciate that I actually DID that specific thing once I was in the job,for whatever reason. There was also the matter that I was a newspaper editor at the time, and I was offering to forego any pay during that five weeks and still do journalism work on my experiences while overseas for that paper ... if only they would cover in my absence and hold the job until my return. No dice.
In the end, I spent a lot of weeks convincing myself that when I’m 95 on my deathbed, I would be a lot sorrier I had passed up a free trip to Asia than had quit a job where my presence was clearly resented. Considering I have since had a couple bosses who have actually worked with me to facilitate a couple leaves of absence and not punished me for the gap - and the first publisher I ever worked for would have jumped at the same opportunity for such articles - I think I made the right call.
But it sure didn’t feel like the right decision when I came back home from Hong Kong. I couldn’t apply for unemployment since I had quit. I had almost no savings because I had moved to Tennessee only the year before, for that job, and hadn’t built anything back up in the bank.
So, I had to hustle in between bouts of feeling sorry for myself and applying for full-time permanent jobs like mad - I signed up with three temp agencies and went on any job they would assign me. I somehow also made contact with a sculptor/caterer and worked intermittently for him for several months helping prep for and serve at several weddings; and did the same a few times as a wedding photographer’s assistant.
(Fun Fact 1: Those huge ice sculptures people commission for special events weigh about 200 pounds and are as just as nerve-wracking to carry and set up on a shaky table as you think they look.)
That same summer I found out the city had a regional film commission that amassed location information for the state office in Nashville, to be pitched to Hollywood studios looking for just the right spot to film a TV show or movie. I managed to get myself contracted for a six-month period as a location scout until I found another job, during which time I did a lot of driving and parking and photographing and researching specific types of areas and buildings to prepare dossiers for the commission director.
(Fun Fact 2: When scouting, you have to include EVERY DETAIL YOU CAN POSSIBLY THINK OF in your description and photos of an area - including if there are visible power lines or other modern items that could screw the pooch in locating to film a period piece.)
I was even given the job of reading the novel “Cold Mountain” by Charles Frazier, and creating a scene-by-scene summary so the commission director could match it against her dossiers on file and pitch East Tennessee to the producers as a potential filming location - yes, THAT “Cold Mountain” starring Nicole Kidman and Jude Law.
(Fun Fact 3: The movie ended up being filmed in Romania, which you might think reflects badly on me … until you consider North Carolina also lost out as a site, despite the novel actually being set in THAT state, because Romania offered the studio a much more generous tax abatement package.)
As 2001 bled into 2002, I managed to get a part-time job working for a lawyer named Dennis. He didn’t mind that my knowledge of the courts was mainly from being a journalist - in fact, it might have helped. You deal with a lot of disparate personalities both as a journalist and as a legal assistant/paralegal, and it’s important to be able to both function as a de facto therapist for, and take no guff from, sometimes, the same callers.
(Fun Fact 4: Most criminal defense clients are more courteous and friendly to their lawyer’s assistants than the civil clients are - I know, more irony, but all “civil” means here are non-criminal cases like divorce, child custody, business lawsuits, Social Security Disability appeals, auto collision claims, mediation, and the like. I became expert in divorce and custody proceedings; I could write parenting plans and petitions for separation in my sleep by the time I left the legal field more than five years later.)
In the category of “everything happens for a reason,” it turned out Dennis was friends with one of the senior editors at the main city newspaper, where I had applied and heard nothing back the year before working for him. Once he saw I was able to quickly learn a new job and he was safe vouching for me, Dennis put in an introduction to the editor and I gained a regular freelance gig of covering a small city council the next county over. It wasn’t a lot, but eventually I was selling other editors at other publications and websites on story ideas, which kept me sort of fed for the FIVE MORE YEARS it took to find a full-time job again.
I did find out I can learn a lot of skills I knew almost nothing about previously - except mastering unemployment. All these years later, there’s still no magic class for that.
-October 31, 2019