Ten (among many more) things

September 11 is my final day as a FT, company-employed editor. I will not miss the following (in random order because I’m too lazy to sort in any meaningful order):

Supervised by a “manager” who personifies the Peter Principle

Told, “You decide [a style point], you’re the editor,” and then being overruled by illiterate proposal managers

Underappreciated, undervalued, and underpaid

Editing writing by people who don’t know the difference between, for example, its and it’s, their and there

Working with incompetent temp editors

Rarely, if ever, being thanked

Trying to educate people about the time required to do quality editing

Working with graphic designers and desktop publishers who never proof their own work

Working with managers and coordinators who won’t enforce version control, thereby giving writers access to files after my final edit

Writing and updating style guides no one adheres to, let alone reads

What is it about "unavailable" that you don't understand?

Yesterday our new temp-to-perm proposal coordinator (who, incidentally, has more energy and enthusiasm than most of us can stand) sent out an update on where a few active proposal projects stand. In her email she mentioned that there might be some weekend work and asked us to let her know if we would not be available for any of the next several weekends.

I responded by telling her that I would not be available for weekend work in the foreseeable future. (Given that I have one foot out the door, I'm not giving them one extra minute of my time or effort.)

She responded, copying our MoronManager, by asking me to make sure to put that information on the group calendar, which I had already done.

This morning MM came to me with a hard copy of my email to the proposal coordinator in hand, with "I will not be available for weekend work in the foreseeable future" highlighted in bright orange.

MM asked me if I could elaborate on my message. "Sure. I'm busy and unavailable." She then asked me to put that on the group calendar. "I already did that." And I thought, "Why don't you look at the f**kin' thing, you dolt!"

Considering the notion that everything happens for a reason, I think I've come up with why I've had this god-awful job, for a year and a half now. It's so that as I soon ease into semi-retirement—that is, transition out of FT work (read: quit!) into several PT freelance jobs—I can look back at this job and not miss having a FT office job one tiny bit.

"As brooks make rivers, rivers run to seas." John Dryden

As I look toward retirement (later rather than sooner due to the market's hit to my nest egg), I only see retirement in the sense that I'll be collecting Social Security and be on Medicare. I don't plan to or want to stop editing.

To that end, I've been trying to line up several freelance editing positions. I've got the nonfiction book editing and online article editing jobs in place, and I've applied for a "title proofer" position with the company for whom I edit articles.

Another one or two freelance income streams and I'll be set. The confluence of these rivulets could turn into the river that finally carries me away from the horror of my soul-smothering FT job.