When people ask me what I “do” – meaning what my work is – I don’t really feel comfortable just saying I’m working doing matting and framing, 2-3 days a week, in the gift shop. It’s unimpressive. It makes me feel like I’m a layabout, a slacker.
So I tell them I have 3 part-time jobs. It’s just that two of them are essentially “unpaid.” This sounds more like I keep busy. Which I think is actually accurate. Besides my matting and framing job at the gift shop, my other two jobs are: a part time helper / carer for my uncle (to the extent he tolerates that), and a part time systems administrator and designer for a group of hobbyist websites. Somewhat obliquely, I’ve written exactly this thinking before, on this blog.
Today I wanted to write about a sort of 3-way categorization / classification I came up with for my 3 jobs. I rate each job on the dimensions of:
- time – what kind of demands it makes on my time
- challenge – what kind of demands it makes on my ability and talent
- emotions – what kind of emotional demands it makes
Here it is.
My first job – caregiver to a reluctant caregetter:
- easy in terms of time – it probably adds up to less the 10 hours a week, the stuff I do to help him specifically
- easy in terms of challenge – the work isn’t hard; sometimes repetitive or frustrating, but generally not difficult
- stressful in terms of emotions – it’s emotionally quite difficult to work with someone who more often than not resents my efforts to help and frequently denies needing help
My second job – the gift-shop matting and framing clerk:
- easy in terms of time – I only work at most 20 hours / week, often less
- stressful in terms of challenge – the job isn’t actually challenging, but… well, the commute is
- easy in terms of emotions – there’s not much emotional energy required (aside from stress)
My third job – world’s least-paid linux systems analyst and website designer:
- stressful in terms of time – the server often has a very demanding schedule, and it can take a lot of time to get things working right; I probably invest 40 hours per week
- easy in terms of challenge – the job actually is challenging, but in a way that I enjoy, so I think it doesn’t count
- easy in terms of emotions – there’s not much emotional energy required (aside from stress)
So I guess there’s no reason I’m writing this, except I like to analyze and classify things.
[daily log: walking, 3.5km; retailing, 6hr]