Look Out, Your Career is Showing

For those of you who may not know me so well, or even for those who do but can’t quite get a fix on what my career is, I have been working primarily in recruitment and recruitment advertising and marketing for more than 16 years. What that means is that I’ve spent many years helping companies sort out ways to promote their jobs – e.g., help wanted ads, job postings, etc – and their employment brands.  That’s the super-basic “nutshell” and doesn’t include the half year where I worked as a Writers’ Assistant on Spelling Entertainment’s “Love Boat: The Next Wave,” starring Robert Urich. A classic if there ever was one.

What, you may ask, does any of this have to do with school?  Not much, except that it encroached on my Literature class this week.

For my Thursday class, we were assigned to read a short story called “Rodman the Keeper” by Constance Fenimore Woolson. It was written during Reconstruction, and the main character is a former Union soldier named John Rodman who is the keeper of “the national cemetery” located in the South (presumably the one at Andersonville).  

We learn during the story that Rodman wasn’t assigned to this duty but rather learned about it and applied for the post. The first thought I had upon reading this passage was, “I wonder how they went about advertising the job?” After kicking myself hard in the calf for such ridiculousness, I put down the book and considered for a while how one would describe the job to appeal to the right potential candidate, where one would promote such a post back in those days and how one would go about applying.

What… the… heck??? 

Also, while my professors and more intellectual classmates were drawing insightful parallels to classics by Dickens and Faulkner, I sidelined-psychoanalyzed Rodman and declared that “he has serious survivor guilt issues.” 

Ah, well.  As always, Old Dog, New Tricks.

On a side note, if you can manage it, please take a moment and leave some love with fellow blogger at www.rrsahm.com, who is going through a serious, wrenching, personal tragedy right now. And if you know of anyone who refuses to ask for help in troubled times or who is considering suicide, her site is a must-visit right now. Just know it’s raw and it’s real, and it will break your heart.