New Year’s Revelation

I’ve been working at my (anonymous) Part-Time Day Job™ for over three and a half years now. It’s not a glamorous job by any stretch of the imagination, but it pays the bills in a way that leaves time for me to enjoy my life and to pursue… well, me. The job also gets me away from my desk and my little domestic studio space - I do need to come up for air now and then, or else I’ll drown - and it offers me much-needed socialization. I like and get along with most of my co-workers. I’ve made acquaintances with and have even befriended some of the regular customers. Overall it’s not a bad gig.

I’m thankful for the job. At the same time, outside of socialization, it lacks a certain amount of enrichment which, especially as 2025 marched on, I noticed has been absent from my life. Can one be thankful for something that they find to be lacking? Both of these can be true at the same time.

In previous blog entries, I’ve discussed my shift from being a student to no longer being in school after graduating, going from an externally-crafted structure (school) to a self-imposed structure (an open-ended workforce). It was a difficult transition for me. And while having a Part-Time Day Job™ provides at least a framework of structure, it’s as if living in a house that has neither siding nor a roof. Can one live in a house like that? Sure. Will it be comfortable to live in? Not likely.

My experience in school was one of enrichment: socializing, learning, new ideas, new experiences, cognitive challenges, and so on. During my final year of undergrad, I distinctly remember feeling like a tiger trapped in a cage, about to be released. The feeling ran completely through me, from my core to the surface and back again. I was ready and excited for the next step and whatever it would have in store for me. There was an energy burning inside. It was sublime.

On the flip side, in the context of enrichment, my Part-Time Day Job™ only offers socialization. Towards the end of 2025, I made the sad but important realization that, in recent years, I had grown to feel like the cage and not the tiger: a feeling of cold rigidity, a life that had become repetitive like the bars of the cell and, in some ways, stoically impersonal.

Again, I’m thankful for my Part-Time Day Job™. Most shifts are enjoyable at best or neutral at worst. Whatever I’m feeling on the inside - in this case, feeling like a metal cage - is my responsibility, not the responsibility of whatever job I have or the people who work there. If the very same job is what I need right now to pay the bills - which, yes, it is - then it’s up to me to bring the missing enrichment to the proverbial table.

Instead of saying I was no longer a student, I wrote earlier that I was no longer in school. This phrasing is important because I believe everyone is (or should be) a student for the duration of their life. There is always more to learn; I’m a forever student, eager to do so.

While considering ways to bring more enrichment into my life, I thought about what I want to learn and to accomplish, creatively, in 2026 and even into 2027. Like good ol’ St. Nick, I made a list and checked it twice pertaining to my goals, notably what I want to do and when I want to do it.

As I did this, I looked around my studio space and saw the shelves of books staring back at me, waiting to be opened or, at the very least, noticed. Much to their relief, I did notice. I’m pretty sure I saw a few of them exhale. The majority of these books aren’t novels - they are reference books (textbooks, if you prefer; I don’t) about music and orchestration; art and visual composition; writing and storycraft.

I pulled books from the shelf and spent a few days both familiarizing myself with them and outlining which portions of which books I would read and when I would read them in the coming months. Reading the information wouldn’t be (and isn’t ever) enough, so I jotted down creative projects to do alongside the information, some as practice and some to coincide with the larger project goals I have for the year.

I also went online and found interviews (saved for later) of notable figures for the topical areas of continued learning. Specifically for music, I found interviews of Igor Stravinsky, George Crumb, Aaron Copland, Eric Whitacre, and more. Down the line, I’ll do the same for notable visual artists, writers, and game developers. The internet is an invaluable resource if we use it as such.

Once I had all of this written down, I wrote it out on my desk calendar for the coming months (color-coded, mind you). And let me say: seeing my calendar full, with direction, and with time which will be spent intentionally towards what I know will be fulfilling in the coming months, gives me an excited anticipation for the future - much like the tiger about to be released from its cage.

And, I suppose, in the moments between my continued learning and self-improvement, I’ll keep plugging away at my Part-Time Day Job™. It pays the bills.