$75,000.
The number stares back at me from my computer screen. The blue glow brings forward the headache that is slowly building behind my eyes.
$75,000.
I could apply for this job. I’m more than qualified. That money would change my life. $75,000 is $6,250/month. That is more money than I would ever know what to do with. I could pay off my student loans, rent a nice house in a nice neighborhood, I could shop at Whole Foods and go out for drinks and eat at nice restaurants and go to the salon every week. I could shop at Anthropologie and get a subscription to one of those fancy makeup services. I could buy a beautiful wooden bookshelf and fill it with hard cover copies of my favorites books. I could buy nice lotions and expensive face creams and I could sleep every night on a mattress that you get from one of those podcast commercials.
I could be comfortable. I could thrive. I could be happy.
I would have to move to DC. The job can not be done remotely, it says so in the application. I would have to wear makeup every day, it doesn’t say that in the job description but it’s implied. I’d have to get a new car, it doesn’t say that in the job description either but there’s no way in hell I would drive my van around DC. I’d have to be at work every morning at 8am and sit behind a desk under white fluorescent lights and stare at a computer screen from the moment I clock in to the moment my boss asks me to come to his office for a meeting. I’d look at my phone on my 30 minute lunch break and listen to true crime podcasts on my hour long commute home. I’d have to get a gym membership if I wanted to stay in shape for climbing but I could afford a personal trainer with my new paycheck. I’d have to go every day after work for only an hour or so.
I remember when I used to work at a desk in San Jose. I would get up at 6am, bike to the bus station to catch the 7:20 bus over the hill to get to work by 8:30. I’d work under white fluorescent lights and forcefully smile at older men who told me I looked cute in my skirt. I’d stare at my computer screen until 5pm when I’d take the bus home and arrive, exhausted at my house at 8pm. I would open a bottle of wine, drinking alone in the dark, watching Kung Fu Panda or Buffy the Vampire Slayer until it was time to fall asleep and do it all over again.
For $75,000 a year I could do it all over again.
And I would have to stop writing. Did I mention I want to be a writer? For $75,000 I would have to stop doing photography, I would have to stop interviewing women on their journeys of self discovery, I would have to stop drinking cheap beer in trailhead parking lots and climbing all over this continent.
And I would have to stop writing.
I want to write books. I want to be like Sheryl Strayed and Elizabeth Gilbert. I want to write a book that will change lives and make people feel things they didn’t know they needed to feel. I want to write books that will show you that the world is beautiful and painful and that the painful parts can also be beautiful.
$75,000 is nothing compared to what I want to make with my writing. I want to be so well known that my name is household, like Steven King or Neil Gaiman.
And I know the odds. I know that if I manage to write a book and only 4 people buy it I should consider that a wild success. I know that there are hundreds if not thousands of other writers with the same dream who have more time and more connections than I do to make this happen. I know I’m just one speck in the sea of people clamoring to write that next great book.
And I know that if I don’t write a book, if I don’t at least try, I will have died early. I’d just be walking around in my Lucky Brand jeans, driving a nice practical Subaru, with an empty smile and an empty heart. All for $75,000.
The world feels like it’s ending and I’m broke and looking at jobs in DC. There is no “right way” to live your life. And there is no “right way” to make money. I’ve scraped by for the last 7 years working on my own terms. But in order to do that, I have to say no to that $75,000.
I wanted to write this out because I don’t want you to think I’m a charity case. I work hard for the money I make but I’m also here and in this position because I have chosen, actively, not to pursue a career that would keep me comfortable.
Time is the only resource in my life that is not renewable and I have chosen to trade it for things other than money.
The value I derive from the (sometimes challenging) life I live is not always financial. And I’ve chosen this life because I know that every breath I take could be my last. I choose (with immense privilege) to live with less money and more friends. I choose to wake up early to climb and then stay up late to write about it, rather than to wake up early to drive to work.
So, this is the life I have chosen. And I accept it with all its hardships and benefits. I choose the leaky roof, the dead batteries, the four bad transmissions, the clients that stiff me $2,000, the injuries, and the broken fan.
And I also choose to write.