Dead Man Walking or Why I Became a Photographer

I meet so many people who put their life into their day job and identify themselves with their day job, as I used  to do. This is not a good idea for most of us. I ask them to think about that for a moment. What happens then if you lose your day job unexpectedly and through no fault of your own? If your life is your job and you lose your job, then what follows logically from that? (that would be (lose job=lose life))

There is so much to say about this, but I want to be brief as I know myself I do not read long articles, I simply do not have the time. I have seen what happens when you put your day job first and above all else and then lose it. It's not pretty.

After 20 some years I was to be let go from my job, but not right away. I was to do relief coverage for as long as that was needed and then goodbye. I felt like a dead man walking, like people talked while I was in the room but it was as if I was not really there, since I was to be gone anyway, and nothing I would have had to say would have mattered. For all those years I went to work, then went home, and usually did work at home, and then went back to work the next day, on call 24/7 all the while. I realized I had no life and I had no friends, so what was I supposed to do when my job ended?

I became obsessed first with golf, where I met a few people and was starting to figure out my slice, and then with photography, where I met hundreds of people. Once I got heavily into photography and began shooting in full manual, actually knowing what all those settings did, I never looked back. And I will never identify myself with a day job that pays the bills and could end tomorrow ever again. I am a Photographer who has a day job until such time as I retire from that day job and become a full time Photographer.

All I'm saying is for someone who has no life outside of your day job you might want to think about that. For me the end never came and I just moved on to a different department. But having been to the edge I know how it feels, and knowing that I was good at something that nobody can take away from me, and that people appreciate what I do gives me courage and a sense of belonging in the community because of photography that I never had before. So if you find yourself starting to become a Dead Man Walking, hopefully you have something you love that you can turn to like I did.

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