Pr3++yG33kyTh1ng

I've been thinking lately.
Having a truly miserable job seems to put me in the mood to reflect. What chain of events led to this situation? How could it be avoided in the future?
Where did I go wrong? Is it Karma? If so, what the hell did I do in a past life that has resulted in my drinking that completely disgusting industrial coffee every morning? Furthermore, why do I complain when some asshat finished off a carafe without starting another? Seriously, it tastes like it was brewed inside a small animal. Not even the pleasant end of a small animal.
Let's flash back, shall we?

Spring of 1995 - Clarksville, Arkansas

A younger, slightly cooler Garrick reclines on a moldy couch. Between rants about the establishment and selling out and artists who compromise their integrity, he picks at the split ends in his long, golden hair (attractively picks at them) and tries to decide if getting a hot oil treatment makes him somehow a girl, or maybe sold-out, or possibly a sold-out girl.
He plans to graduate, move somewhere awesome and make art. With a smoking hot degree in Theatre, there isn't much else a person CAN do, right? He is committed to this course of action.
After shouting his outrage one more time at the injustice and hypocrisy of "The Academy" and their trumped up, meaningless, exploitive awards, he takes a short nap.

Two months later, blind panic compels him to spurn possible professional set design internship-type jobs . . . To move to Southwest Louisiana to help his parents through whatever trauma was going on at the time. "Theatre can wait a bit," he thinks. "Maybe I can find a small troupe to join down here, right? To pass the time."

There isn't a lot of set design work in Southwest Louisiana. I fact, I'll bet there is less set design work there than you would think, even if you think you may fully realize how little there is.
Picture the average amount of professional theatrical sets designed and constructed in the whole "heel looking" portion of Louisiana in a one year period. Hell, include film sets.
I'll bet the actual number is about an eighth of the number you came up with. Rounded down.

A haircut later, Set Design qualifications translate into Interior Design work.
After talking his first customer into an additional ottoman, he begins to question again whether this somehow makes him sold-out (I'm just doing this until things are better with my folks) or, again, some kind of girl (Interior Design, people). He consoles himself with a hot oil treatment.

Working for commission is never easy. It is especially difficult when one's employer refuses to actually pay it. Cosmically speaking, this portion of our tale is over pretty quickly.
Interior Design leads to Sales leads to Marketing leads to the graveyard shift at an Adult Contemporary radio station.
This, my friends is where it happens. "I'll get to use my voice training," he thinks. "I'll get to create and improvise and make people laugh." He is so certain that this will be just like theatre that it will be as far removed from selling out as it is possible to be. To clinch the artistic highroad, the job pays minimum wage. He can starve, too. How poetic!

Flash forward to Autumn of 1998 - Lake Charles, Louisiana

A slightly older, increasingly bitter late night DJ ponders if anyone is listening. His set list is dictated by computers driven by people in the recording industry. His breaks are scripted and timed to allow for maximum commercial airplay. Technology allows him to queue up an entire show, six hours, where he can rollerblade around the empty building and not set skated foot inside the actual booth all night.
He hears his own voice over the speakers placed all over the building.
"Stay tuned after the break, my friends. We have great music coming up from Kenny G, Elton John and Celine Dion." This is followed by commercials.

I can talk about it now. It is still painful, yes, but I'm recovering.
It was at this moment that I decided the course I would follow. With these words:
"Stay tuned after the break, my friends. We have great music coming up from Kenny G, Elton John and Celine Dion."
I had sold out my whole belief system. In a smarmy voice, no less. It sounded like I meant it.
For minimum wage.
Since that moment, that awful moment of realizing that I would, in fact, lie - and lie convincingly - for minimum wage, it has all been about renegotiating my price.
If I'm going to be a total whore, I'd like to be fairly compensated for it. Eventually, I'd like the word "whore" replaced in my contracts with the work "mercenary".