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The Nature of Part Time

What is the nature of a part time job?

It is to be a swing person that can work in a finger snap? Or is the nature of part time to be willing to work the shifts no one else wants?

As a youngster, I was involved in radio a lot and I loved the live medium.

I was a part timer that worked the weekends and the weekend overnights.  If someone took ill during the week, I had to sit in the chair and take over with less than an hour’s notice.

Wherever I was in the city, when the radio called, I had to go.  That dedication to work meant I missed a lot of weekend opportunities to spend time with friends and to have any sort of a social life.

Being on the radio raised no peer chits.  In fact, there was a certain resentment among my friends and associates that I was “too young” to be on the radio, and that I should be working as a waiter in a restaurant like them.

The moment of clarity about working on the radio hit me an hour after I had four wisdom teeth removed.  I was pumped up with codeine and not feeling good.  I could not speak.  I could barely open my swollen mouth.

The phone rang.

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A Boss is Not a Friend

In America we have, for some reason, come upon the notion that your boss must like you:  Your boss must be your friend.

The problem with that shallow thinking is friendships prefer equality over stratification. Friends don’t like to take orders from friends.

A boss’ job is to instruct, direct and lead and there are no co-boss companies that work well because the direction is divided and opportunity is split like Solomon’s baby.

If your boss demands friendship — be wary — because at any time the friendship can be revoked while the master-and-slave dyad necessarily remains. 

If you wish to befriend your boss, immediately retire that notion.  You will be seen as cloying and clever — and neither of those labels can ever overcome the emotion of friendship falsely offered.

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Graveyards Will Kill You

Many of us were shocked to learn working the graveyard shift will kill you.

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A Return to the Workhouse

When Ebenezer Scrooge wondered aloud in Charles Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol” — “Are there no prisons? Are there no workhouses?” — in response to a request for a charitable donation, that inquiry should make us wonder today if, indeed, we should make a reformed visit to the workhouse ideal.

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Saying No Means Yes

Turning down work can be a good thing if the price and terms aren’t right.

You, as an author, must know your value in the marketplace even if those around you — like agents and friends and publishers and managers — do not.

If you get a dollar a word for writing an article, do not allow yourself to be lowballed at a dime a word.

You know your bottom line.  You know your ability.  Trust the faith in yourself.  Demand the wages and royalties and stipends you deserve. 

To back down from the needs of the self is to damage the needs and wants of others who hope to walk along down the path of success with you.

Saying “No” to a bad deal can mean a “Yes” to own well-being.