So week two on the panhandling circuit. At least I shaved this morning, first time in a week. I want to appear "professional", after all.
I applied for unemployment last week, the first time I've been able to do that. Over the past couple of years I've worked for several employers essentially full-time, but I was never on the payroll and considered a freelancer, so when I was ultimately cut loose I was on my own. But thanks to my brief salaried stint here in Bako, the vast untold riches of unemployment have been put at my disposal... $240 a week! While that may be chump change back in LA, that's real money here in Bako. Not that I can get used to it. The minute I accept a piddly $500 contract job, the State of California will consider me FULLY EMPLOYED! and pull the plug.
But I have been methodical over the past week. After a thorough assessment of the Bakersfield job market, an exhaustive review of the available job openings, and with consideration of my art degree and 20 years experience in the advertising business, I've determined there are exactly two career paths available for me...
Tattoo artist and children's face painting.
Although I faint at the sight of blood and I hate children, so both may prove problematic.
The pipe dream of getting work from LA is also proving to be unrealistic. The great promise of the digital age was that we would all be able to telecommute and work out of "virtual offices". And it actually came true for awhile. A year ago when we moved here I was able to maintain the charade of being in LA and accepting work I could do at home. But the Brave New World ran head-on into good old human nature - people are by nature control freaks. No matter how much work you produce off-site, how quickly, you still can't shake the perception among clients that you're really just surfing porn in your underwear on their dime. Plus there's no way to stand over your shoulder and browbeat you when you aren't there, and that is evidently a very important part of the process.
And then you have to add in security concerns. Clients aren't comfortable with all their assets floating around with faceless freelancers. There's always the chance that an un-retouched photo of Julia Roberts could show up online and then heads would roll. Personally, I think that's little more than a red herring. The real concern among clients is that people like me will post the clever, brilliant, groundbreaking work that they've done on their own websites, the work that the clients have almost always KILLED, and then they'll be exposed as the talentless hacks that they are. I've seen it happen before...
"Can you believe THIS is the movie poster they went with... when they could've had THIS?!?!?!?!?!"
Clients HATE that.
The bottom line is most clients want you on-site now, even if it's just for a day or two. And unless I'm prepared to sleep in my car on the streets of Burbank for work, I think trawling for work in LA is beyond pointless.
So that leaves really only one option. Beating the bushes for work here in Bako, going door to door like Willy Loman if necessary. Not my first choice, that's for sure. But it's not like I have choices anymore.
