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I’ve been doing some woodworking projects recently (a pipe desk, I’ll post pics soon), and remembered how much I enjoy working with my hands and then being able to see a tangible outcome, it’s quite rewarding. In this digital age, where the computer feels like an extension of myself far too often, it’s refreshing and positively humanistic to return to analog. It got me thinking about my career choices, whatever those are, and the way we understand and process “success” in this country.
Growing up I was always told I would go to college, get a degree, and then proceed directly into my relevant chosen career path and this would make me successful, with money and status set as the underlying measure of this success. But, what if you don’t fit into the 9-5, corporate, medical, science, etc.. fields, does that mean you are less intelligent or less competent per se? In this country, blue collar or manual work generally illicits notions of the undereducated and the ignorant or unaware, and sadly a lot of times it’s probably true. Manual work has been culturally devalued and undermined due in part to our temporary/tear down culture and to our cultural emphasis and importance on status and money. Things are made for quantity and mass production, and quality and worth and value are lost.
I spent some time in London this past Autumn, surrounded by old buildings with history and wisdom we seldom see in the States. I think being surrounded by that sort of history on a daily basis gives you a longer and wider vision of substance, and an appreciation, even if just subconciously, for worth and value beyond your own time or place. As a result, “Blue Collar” is often culturally different in the UK, and to a larger extent there’s a respect for a craft or trade done “proper” and right. Trades can then be valued for the substance of their work, not the effeciency or quantity produced. Of course this is not always the case even abroad, as we’ve become more “modern” and “evolved”, they too have traded quality for quantity.
My roommate in London, James, was a trained contractor. We had many conversations about his extensive training and the depth and detail that were involved. James was one of the most educated and respectable persons I had met, but chose contracting because he was passionate about it, not because of status it might bring him. The question is though, is whether or not his society is more culturally permissive or conduit to his choice. I think these are relevant questions for our evolving times.
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