Ignore Everybody - MacLeod, Hugh [19]
35. Beware of turning hobbies into jobs.
It sounds great, but there is a downside.
THE LATE BRITISH BILLIONAIRE JAMES GOLD-SMITH once quipped, “When a man marries his mistress, he immediately creates a vacancy.”
What’s true in philanderers is also true in life.
When I was about nineteen I knew this guy called Andrew, who was a junior accountant, a few years out of college.
Andrew didn’t really like being an accountant—at least, that’s what he was fond of saying. His passion, of all things, was antique silverware. In particular, antique silver cutlery. In particular, antique silver teaspoons.
He knew a lot about antique silver teaspoons. He collected them en masse. He lived and breathed them. OK, maybe that’s a pretty strange hobby, but hey, he was pretty much a national authority on them.
To make a long story short, eventually he quit his accountancy gig and got a new job at a very prestigious auction house, specializing in valuing silverware.
I remember buying him a drink and congratulating him. What happy news!
A few years later, I was hanging out at the same bar with some mutual acquaintances, and his name came up in conversation. This time the news wasn’t so happy.
Apparently he had recently lost his job. Apparently he had developed a huge drinking problem.
What a bloody shame.
“That’s why you should never turn your hobby into your job,” said one of my friends, someone far older and wiser than I. “Before, this man had a job and a hobby. Now suddenly, he’s just got the job, but no hobby anymore. But a man needs both, you see. And now what does this man, who’s always had a hobby, do with his time?”
My friend held up his glass.
“Answer: Drink.”
Make of that what you will.
36. Savor obscurity while it lasts.
Once you “make it,” your work is never the same.
IT’S A FAMILIAR STORY, RETOLD COUNTLESS times. A talented person creates something amazing and wonderful when she’s young, poor, hungry, and alone, and the world doesn’t care. Then one day something happens and her luck is changed forever. Next thing you know she’s some sort of celebrity, making all sorts of obscene sums, hanging out with royalty and movie stars. It’s a dream a lot of young artists have, something to sustain them during their early, lean years.
The funny thing is, when you hear the “rock stars” talk about their climb to the top, the part they invariably speak most fondly of is not the part with all the fame, money, and parties. It’s the part before they made it, back when they were living in a basement without electricity and “eating dog food,” back when they were doing their breakthrough work.
Back when they were young, and inventing a new language to speak to the world with. More important, back when they were young, and inventing a new language other people could also speak to the world with.
Some years ago, after he’d been playing stadiums for a while, the rock singer Neil Young was booed off the stage by his fans when he tried playing new country-and-western material. They didn’t want to share in his new adventures. No, they had paid their money to hear the classic rock, dammit. “Down by the River” and “Heart of Gold,” dammit. And if they didn’t get it, dammit, they’d be out for blood. As events proved.
It’s hard to invent a new language when a lot of people are already heavily invested in your work (including yourself). When a lot of people are already fluent in the language you’re currently speaking, and they don’t want anything new from you. Like the Neil Young fans, they don’t want to see your metaphorical new movie, they just want to watch the sequel to the old one.
And success needs lots of people to keep the show on the road. When it’s just you, a dream, and a few cans of dog food, there’s only one person to worry about. But when the dream turns into reality, there’s all sorts of other people suddenly needing to be taken care of, in order to keep the engine running. Publishers, investors, managers, journalists,