After reading this post about non-profit salaries, I'm thinking about money.
I'm thinking about my ever increasing debt (no, that's not accurate. For the moment, my debt is not getting any larger, but not any smaller either).
I'm thinking about being a "part-time" instructor, which means I carry the same load as most profs in my department, but get a fraction of the compensation. I'm not bitter--I knew what I was signing up for. Just thinking.
I'm thinking about when I made $14.88/hour and thought livin' was easy. (If you're trying to do the math, that comes out to just over 30K/year.)
About a year ago, when I got my first acceptance letter (email), my dad asked how much I was going to be paid. When I said nothing, Dad got pissed, said it wasn't fair that someone else was profiting from my hard work and creativity. I had a hard time explaining that the people who published my work weren't making a profit either.
I've talked about this before--practicality vs. passion and all that, plus a working class mentality and growing up with parents who were born during the depression (my mother reuses paper towels, makes "garbage soup" instead of throwing out leftovers that have passed their prime, and my father thinks Velveeta boxes are the best organizational tools ever), so when I think about teaching and writing poetry just because I love words and books, I get a little itchy.
I don't want to be "rich" -- which is a relative term, because I think if I made 50K a year I wouldn't know what to do with it -- but I'd like to be in a position where I don't have to think about money quite so often. I guess the problem is that whatever amout of money I make, I find a way to spend it, so that there's always a need for more.
Upward mobility is expensive.
Poem: Far Gone
2 days ago
4 comments:
I feel ya, girl! Growing up one of four kids on the household income of a (then-non-tenured, working two jobs at a time) engineering professor, money was pretty tight. That didn't give me a very positive view of how academics were treated. Nevertheless, my mom, in her fifties, in on route to her phd so she can teach. And me? Well, I'm still freelance writing post-MFA and dreaming of all that money I gave up when I stopped being a full-time technical writer/manager. Poetry can pay off, but it seems like a big gamble for most of us. It's hard for me too! Sometimes I wake up and say, "what was I thinking?"
Thanks Jeannine! I wish I'd had a more realistic view of academics going into this--I'm 1st generation college grad and used to imagine that profs were mini-celebrities. So sad to learn they're just people who love to read. : ) At any rate, a little bitching and moaning won't change the fact that more than anything, I want to spend the next 30 years in an English department.
That sounds like a good reason to become an English prof to me! And, my Dad has loved his job lately - you know, after tenure and everything - he gets to teach (mostly) what he wants and he genuinely is excited to go into work at 67. That is something, right?
I feel like I know where you're coming from. I am constantly asking myself if I'm making the right decision, ignoring the fact that I still have no income, to pursue a degree that may not help me get one.
And, at the same time, I know this is a huge opportunity and that, in some way, it will pay off in the end.
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