Over the past few years I have tortured myself by living in this cutthroat city that I’ve grown to love. I’ve learned a myriad of things: 1- Don’t say Houston the wrong way unless you want to get into a tedious, but heated conversation about why the pronunciation is the way it is, 2- The price variation from borough to borough is staggering and quite frankly obnoxious, 3- Every native New Yorker has this strange, almost violent hatred for New Jersey 4- Tourists will spend ridiculous amounts of money to visit free museums and the most important thing I’ve learned 5- Your job is what makes you who you are. The last one is the one I would like to discuss in more detail and though it sounds outrageous and stupid, it’s actually true. I escaped Miami because I felt it was all too superficial for me- the plastic surgery, the brand obsession, Pit Bull. The most annoying thing about being from Miami, though? The predilection for everyone I’ve ever met to somehow reference the Big Willy song. Welcome to Miami or as I’d like to call it, Welcome to My Own Personal Hell. Man, I really don’t like that song. Anyway, Miami isn’t so bad. I’ve given it a hard time for years, but my disgust with it is lessening little by little.

When I moved up here I thought I was escaping the vapid judgments that followed discussions about people’s occupations. There is this sickening air of superiority that exudes off of certain persons that clouds their ability to be a decent human being. Just because you work for this particular person/company does not make the universe revolve around you- I was going to follow up with an involved science joke, but I refrained. You’re welcome.

I have witnessed and heard many conversations about jobs and have fallen victim to tweaking my job title to sound fancier than it is. I work in retail, and when I tell people what I do I say, I work at a vintage shop, which sounds so hip and cool but in reality it’s soul-sucking and depressing. However, I am very happy to have this job in this capricious economy, that’s not what this is about, it’s about the need to ask people what they do when you meet them as if their profession is going to dictate your feelings about them. 

I remember in college my sociology professor (of course) asked us what we wanted when we grew up. A lot of people answered with what they wanted their occupation to be, but one person said they wanted to be happy and we all looked at them and agreed. Of course, duh, that’s really what’s important. Happiness. It’s so easy to forget how important happiness is when living in a city like this where everything costs more than a kidney or literally costs your kidney. It doesn’t matter what you do, that should never mandate who you are as a person and no one should ever judge your worth on your job title. It’s just plain dumb. Why is that such an important question to drive conversation, anyway? There are literally millions of other things people can talk about, but that is the one subject everyone clings onto for dear life when meeting new people. Ugh, drives me nuts.

This honestly has little to do with my post, but I freakin love this song.