Prompt #87: The World of Work

Writing Exercise, August 2023

Hi Friends,

I’m getting ready to head out to Burning Man next week, where I’ll be writing to you from the Nevada desert. For those of you who are not familiar with Burning Man, it’s an ephemeral city of about 80,000 people, built on a dry lakebed (the playa) in the Black Rock Desert. At the culmination of the event, a wooden effigy is burned, hence the name, though Burning Man is so much more than that.

The reasons I go year after year are the spectacular art structures set against the canvas of a harsh desert landscape and the community of wonderful people. The city runs on a gift economy, meaning that it’s the participants who create the experience for each other, creating a generous, loving community.

You also get to wear whatever you want, and I love seeing the creative ways different people dress. I’ve been going through my own boxes, trying to decide whether or not to bring the pink fishnets, the sequined gown, or the leopard-print dress.

Sunset at Burning Man

Going through these clothes, or costumes, as some might call them, I am reminded of an activity we did in the fourth grade, where we got to come to school in a costume. We were studying careers and work, and we were asked to dress up in the uniform we would wear in our future dream job. This became a dilemma for me because I had two dream jobs in mind. I told my teacher I wanted to be both a writer and a ski instructor. She said I had to choose one, which now seems ridiculous to me since I have managed to work both of these jobs simultaneously in my adult life, though to give her credit, I do wear different outfits for each—ski clothes for one and my pajamas for the other. Had I known about the writer’s uniform back then, I might have gone to school in my pjs. But I didn’t, so I wore my ski clothes to school, which ended up being hot and uncomfortable, especially when my goggles fogged up inside.

To my surprise, I was the only child dressed as a ski instructor at “Dream job” day. There were doctors and nurses and even circus performers, but I was the only one who thought skiing would make the perfect career. And as it turned out, from age 8, I knew exactly what I wanted and I went on to work as a professional ski instructor for 10 years. I tell people now that the key to achieving our goals is to know what those goals are. So often, we don’t know what we really want, so it’s impossible to achieve our desires.

When I consider the two things I love most in the world—writing and skiing—I think about how one is indoor and sedentary but takes a lot of brain power, while the other is outdoor and active, and I don’t have to think, aside from paying attention to what’s right in front of me. I need both of these things in my life—deep thinking and the break from it. The thing they have in common is that neither are very