All the Jobs I Have Ever Had ("Shit" or otherwise.....)
BABYSITTER - from age 12 on
"PAPERPERSON" - also from age 12 0n....back when you had to do "the fold and toss"... no plastic bag wussy stuff
SECRETARIAL ASSISTANT at St. Patrick's Rectory - answer the phones and count the offering $$
MCDONALD'S (in my high school jr. & senior years-hardest job I ever had-the Hell's Angels were the most polite customers)
PORTRAITS FOR COMMISSION (also did this during high school while working at Mickey D's-had a booth at those outdoor Art Fairs-even back then I did a lot of detail, and grossly underquoted.... I believe that I sometimes made as little as $1 per hour)
AU PAIR/NANNY - (when I was 18...for the grandchildren of a former prime minister of finance under Giscard D'Estaing- they treated me like family- a great gig)
SUPERMARKET CASHIER (lasted 2 weeks-could not hack it-all the pungent drooling homeless people counting out their pennies to buy malt liquor, parents buying crap food for their kids with WIC checks, women loaded down with diamonds and gold complaining about 2 cent price differences)
BOARDMAN'S CATALOG SHOWROOM (take the order, scale 4-5 stories in the storeroom like a monkey [SO fun!!!], grab the appliance and throw the box down to someone waiting below). All the other girls (the ones who measured their worth by the number of gold chains they had received from their boyfriends) worked at the jewelry counter out front. Working in the back with the guys was a blast.
SALESPERSON/GREETER at The Limited - again, only a 2-3 week job. I did not possess the talent for fake smiling while I said, "Hi! How are you?! Our sweaters are 20% off today!"
PROFESSIONAL FRAMER in Deck the Walls at the Mall (30 hours a week while carrying a full course load at SUNY B... bus to class in the morning, ride my bike or a bus to the Mall a few miles away at 5, back to school at 10:30 pm to paint until I couldn't stay awake, bike or bus back home to sleep, sometimes paint all night or crash in the studio. repeat)
TEACHING ASSISTANT- (painting department - SUNY B... got in trouble because someone told the administration that I was teaching the class while the professor read the paper in his office or never bothered to show up at all)
TAUGHT STAINED GLASS - not for credit at SUNY B
REAL ESTATE - got my license and tried to help my Dad start up his business. Lasted about 2 months. This marks the moment I realized that I never wanted to sell anything to anyone again for as long as I lived.
CAMERA/PHOTO PROCESSING store (employees really DO make extra copies of those interesting photos)
ART DIRECTOR at an ad agency- (small agency... layout, paste-up, drew lots of sneakers and athletic clothes for Dick's Clothing and Sporting Goods back when they only had a few stores, wrote radio spots, handled some clients... worked up to 70 hours a week for a pittance salary, my ads won some awards after I left, they never told me. Job made me physically ill from stress. Left this job to go back to grad school.)
COMPUTER LAYOUT - catalogs for Gaylord Bros., one of the largest library suppliers in the world.
HABERSHAM PLANTATION - got paid a few hundred dollars per piece to paint Monet scenes on the fronts of pine armoires, which they then sold for 4-5 thousand dollars.
SOME TEMP WORK- handing out samples at Costco (getting me through the summers in grad school)
TEACHING ASSISTANT, University of Georgia
RESTORATION ASSISTANT to James Swope Fine Art Conservation (restored a huge mural in a theater on UGA campus)
TENURE TRACK TEACHING POSITION, FIU, Miami
FULL TIME ARTIST
BABYSITTER - from age 12 on
"PAPERPERSON" - also from age 12 0n....back when you had to do "the fold and toss"... no plastic bag wussy stuff
SECRETARIAL ASSISTANT at St. Patrick's Rectory - answer the phones and count the offering $$
MCDONALD'S (in my high school jr. & senior years-hardest job I ever had-the Hell's Angels were the most polite customers)
PORTRAITS FOR COMMISSION (also did this during high school while working at Mickey D's-had a booth at those outdoor Art Fairs-even back then I did a lot of detail, and grossly underquoted.... I believe that I sometimes made as little as $1 per hour)
AU PAIR/NANNY - (when I was 18...for the grandchildren of a former prime minister of finance under Giscard D'Estaing- they treated me like family- a great gig)
SUPERMARKET CASHIER (lasted 2 weeks-could not hack it-all the pungent drooling homeless people counting out their pennies to buy malt liquor, parents buying crap food for their kids with WIC checks, women loaded down with diamonds and gold complaining about 2 cent price differences)
BOARDMAN'S CATALOG SHOWROOM (take the order, scale 4-5 stories in the storeroom like a monkey [SO fun!!!], grab the appliance and throw the box down to someone waiting below). All the other girls (the ones who measured their worth by the number of gold chains they had received from their boyfriends) worked at the jewelry counter out front. Working in the back with the guys was a blast.
SALESPERSON/GREETER at The Limited - again, only a 2-3 week job. I did not possess the talent for fake smiling while I said, "Hi! How are you?! Our sweaters are 20% off today!"
PROFESSIONAL FRAMER in Deck the Walls at the Mall (30 hours a week while carrying a full course load at SUNY B... bus to class in the morning, ride my bike or a bus to the Mall a few miles away at 5, back to school at 10:30 pm to paint until I couldn't stay awake, bike or bus back home to sleep, sometimes paint all night or crash in the studio. repeat)
TEACHING ASSISTANT- (painting department - SUNY B... got in trouble because someone told the administration that I was teaching the class while the professor read the paper in his office or never bothered to show up at all)
TAUGHT STAINED GLASS - not for credit at SUNY B
REAL ESTATE - got my license and tried to help my Dad start up his business. Lasted about 2 months. This marks the moment I realized that I never wanted to sell anything to anyone again for as long as I lived.
CAMERA/PHOTO PROCESSING store (employees really DO make extra copies of those interesting photos)
ART DIRECTOR at an ad agency- (small agency... layout, paste-up, drew lots of sneakers and athletic clothes for Dick's Clothing and Sporting Goods back when they only had a few stores, wrote radio spots, handled some clients... worked up to 70 hours a week for a pittance salary, my ads won some awards after I left, they never told me. Job made me physically ill from stress. Left this job to go back to grad school.)
COMPUTER LAYOUT - catalogs for Gaylord Bros., one of the largest library suppliers in the world.
HABERSHAM PLANTATION - got paid a few hundred dollars per piece to paint Monet scenes on the fronts of pine armoires, which they then sold for 4-5 thousand dollars.
SOME TEMP WORK- handing out samples at Costco (getting me through the summers in grad school)
TEACHING ASSISTANT, University of Georgia
RESTORATION ASSISTANT to James Swope Fine Art Conservation (restored a huge mural in a theater on UGA campus)
TENURE TRACK TEACHING POSITION, FIU, Miami
FULL TIME ARTIST
posted by Kate at 10:40 PM
1 Comments:
update... during the recession I went back to teaching as the grants dried up and the sales went down.
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