I don't get paid for this as much as you think. Like a lot of modern enterprises and enterprising up-and-coming nearly-50-year-olds, I'm willing to keep plugging away at it for (and you're not going to believe this) no money at all because what is something as base and prosaic as a paycheck-for-labor when there is EXPOSURE to be had? Anybody can just "earn money" like a nonfamous Jill Bag-O'-Doughnuts doing things like, I dunno, bagging donuts, then take that sweet donut money and exchange it for goods and services like shelter, sustenance and Verizon Fios. But what chance does that person have of ever getting the attention of the big shots higher up in the donut-bagging industry and becoming an independently wealthy icon of the culture with the kind of influence and sway to pay another person to bag their donuts for them for the rest of their lives?
None, that's what, because donut-bagging is an end in and of itself. There are no "higher ups." You show up, someone else has already properly nutted all the dough, you stand behind the glass counter and wait for strangers to pick what color of cruller they want, even though you know all the crullers taste exactly the same.* But you tuck the donuts into whatever size-appropriate receptacle matches their order, you exchange the funds that they earned bagging whatever it is they bagged at their job, and you go on with your day. And what have you accomplished, really? Are you just a cog in a capitalist machine, designed to grind you down to powder and not even stand around to watch as what's left blows away in a moderate wind at the end of the terrifyingly brief usefulness window of your life? Unquestioningly. But you also gave someone donuts, which means at the very least you know you made one person (if not an entire family) happy for a little while. Or at least provided whatever illusion of happiness that can be achieved with the right amount of processed sugar and frying oil. Which is, I feel like I should say, quite a lot.
The value isn't always in the valuation, though, that's the point. Working for nothing, of course, is objectively stupid in most cases, though it's a growing part of the economy as we read in many cringe-inducing stories about "influencers" trying to trade a few promotional kind words for goods and services, in lieu of cold, hard specie. Or even better, actual companies trying to hire people for the privilege of experience, which sounds great, but it's really difficult to try and transfer that along to a dentist when you suddenly need an tooth abscess drained.
I don't get paid for this, and I don't really do it for the exposure either. Not that I have any kind of resentment or disdain for whatever is happening out there in the audience, quite the actual opposite. The fact that anyone has ever read any of this even once still frankly frightens and confuses me a little, so I say this with great love, affection and gratitude: I don't do this for you, either.
There was a weird pull during the pandemic lockdown, "now is your chance to do the thing you always wanted!" Like write poetry or paint or sculpt or learn Portuguese or whatever. For some reason the hypothetical goal was always artistic or academic, it was never like "hit the character level cap on World of Warcraft." The implicit idea underneath is that we'd spend the time gaining proficiency at something because proficiency means something is ready to shove out onto the marketplace, the only way we can tell if something is any good or not. Whether it is (quite literally) worth anything.
I just kept doing this all through the pandemic lockdown, without slowing or blinking (except literally, I did literally blink, quite a lot. Like a normal amount), but it turned out I was way ahead of the curve. I was doing this for absolutely no measurable reason for decades before there was a lockdown. There is one practical purpose, if practice is practical (which seems likely given they have all those letters in common). But I've never felt the need to turn this around and make something that makes money or makes anything else. Expression is its own end. It's right there in the name, without expectation of outcome or impact. It is, expressly, an out. A product. An exhale. It is in you and it demands to be expelled, ejected; birthed, if you want to get gross about it. It doesn't have to be for anyone but me. Which is a really weird thing to say on a publicly available blog.
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*I know "not the chocolate ones" obviously, this is not the time for your pedantry.
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