Avoiding the answer to the question on day 6

Today's topic: "If you couldn't answer with your job, how would you answer the question, 'what do you do'?"

Sometimes I get cynical and think this is a stupid question, instead of saying 'so what do you do?' Why not just say 'so, how much money are you making?'

 

But I know that's not always the case.

 I love finding out what people do, how they came to do what they do, hearing 'inside the profession' stories and so on.  Maybe it's just a bad day for me to be answering this question, but what I do is a little bit of a sensitive subject still.

 

Not being legally able to work for a few months made me think about how to answer this question long before it came up in the blog-a-day-challenge.

 

I was in a new place, everybody I was meeting was new, all new conversation started with 'so what do you do?'.  When finding out I wasn't working the follow up question was always 'so what do you want to do?'.  Even then I had a really hard time answering.

 

Anyway, I'm still technically not in a job, so I'll answer with what what I do, that's not a job title.

 

What I do is, learn about craft distilling and publishing and blogging and marketing and social media and research and thinking of new ideas for old spaces and general expectations of the American employee.

 Going through a time of not having a quick and impressive answer to 'so, what do you do' has taught me to not find my identity in work. It's challenged me to not feel 'less' than others because of this season in my life. It's helped me focus on other things that I do do, like doing life as a wife, a Christian, an immigrant, a new cook and other such labels.