Art vs Commerce Part II: A Not Uncommon Struggle
On lying to oneself (and also to strangers at cocktail parties)
“I’M A WRITER.”
That’s what I’d like to tell people when they ask me what I do.
But instead I tell them:
“I’m a creative director at an advertising agency.”
Which is true. And yet, this simple taxonomical dilemma is the root cause of my all-consuming existential trepidation. I find myself contemplating it every minute of every day: while stuck in traffic, while playing at the park with my daughter, while watching the latest episode of whatever hot new TV show it is my cultural duty to watch, while I’m in the shower, while I’m eating dinner, while my wife is trying to communicate some urgent responsibility of homeownership that she needs to me to address, while I’m thumbing through Instagram, while I’m scrolling through Twitter, while I’m mowing the lawn, while I’m playing hockey, while I’m drinking beers after hockey, while I’m asleep, while I’m awake, while I’m trying to think about sex to prevent myself from thinking about being a creative director at an advertising agency (and, clearly, failing) — this question of who I am and how I spend my time is perpetually on my mind. And I’m sick of it. Actually, I have been made sick by it. This elemental anxiety feels, now, like a lingering illness that I can’t quite shake; it has weakened my bones, torn up my lungs.
And, yes, before we go any further: I know, I know — it’s not an uncommon struggle. The same debate that has raged in the brains and hearts of entitled first-world citizens since the dawn of the Middle Class, when those two necessarily disparate pursuits — spiritual fulfillment and biological survival — began to overlap: do I pursue my passion or pay the bills? But, whatever its sociological and historical origins, this question of who I am and how I spend my time is, for me, of course, deeply personal. Whether or not my own happiness and fulfillment matter to you, or to the country, or to the grand arc of humanity history, they may matter deeply to me, and so I will indulge my right to whinge and whine and philosophize about them —
But I am being purposefully self-deprecating. This sort of thing is difficult to talk about. The fact that I can distinguish a thing like fulfillment from my fundamental social and biological responsibilities (as a father, husband, son, citizen, human, etc.) is an acknowledgment of profound privilege. Particularly when my spiritual fulfillment is rooted in such a solitary, self-serving act — sitting alone, thinking, writing, contributing to a body of work that represents my individual perspective — as opposed to, say, the kind of fulfillment that might come from a person’s selfless urges to dig wells in a third-world country or write letters on behalf of political prisoners or shelter refugees.
Yes, my goals often seem terribly narcissistic. I just want to be left alone, to write, to make things. And I do that, sometimes. Some times. Some, times. Sometimes, after I’m done creative directing, and mowing the lawn, and playing with my daughter at the park, and scrolling through Twitter — sometimes, I write, and am, briefly, a writer.
I want that to be the part of me that matters: that I write, and am therefore a writer. But I write mostly in my spare time, so, when people ask me what I do, which is cocktail party shorthand for the much larger question of who are you and what are you all about, I tell them that I’m a creative director at an advertising agency, which, though a noble pursuit and impressive accomplishment and perfectly accurate description of how I spend my days, nonetheless feels like the worst kind of lie, ie. a lie you tell yourself.
Because I’m not a creative director at an advertising agency. Not in my heart.
In my heart, I am a writer.
So why can’t I say it?
Next Week: Art vs Commerce Part III: A Good Living
