Today (27th April 2011), after nearly 12 months of very little paid work I approached the DSS (or whatever they’ve been rebranded to) to make a claim for Job Seekers Allowance. I am, after all, completely brassic, finding paid work a little elusive and, more importantly finally feeling that I’m emerging from a long and rather painful period of being plagued by that insidious little ‘black dog’ that can snap away at one’s energy, self-worth and enthusiasm. Let’s just say the bark has been lessened by the assistance of a couple of therapies both of which I have previously strenuously resisted.
In short, I feel that after several years of ‘thinking about it’ I have been making some serious inroads into my life as a professional photographer – creating and shooting personal projects, asking friends if they would be so kind to put up with my ham-fisted attempts at their headshots/portraits and have now, in a very short space of time actually been asked to do some paid work! i. e. 2 gigs this weekend and another the following week! Nothing momentous, but it feels like a real turning point.
I did have every intention to do this around this time last year, but, unfortunately, I was distracted by something that looked far too good to turn down at the time and which subsequently came back and bit me BIG time. Lesson learned? Not sure, but we’ll see if it happens again.
The point to some of this is that I, somewhat naively, declared some of this to the ‘powers that be’ (I was starting a business, looking to go self-employed yada-yada-yada) and was told that I was NOT entitled to JSA because I was doing too much work! As far as I can remember the maximum is 15 hours a week ( irrespective of whether you’re paid or unpaid) and I’d declared 21! Stupid me for attempting to be honest and also not previously seeking advice about what I could/should not do. Hmmm.
So I should, by now, have known to have learnt to play the game? It hasn’t changed since the last time I signed on some 15-20 years ago. More fool me as I should have just kept my mouth shut, given them the answers they wanted to hear, played at being ‘available for work’ whilst all the while deliberately doing what I intend to do all along. Part of my problem with this is that this really feels like an encouragement, a set-up, to lie, and I would really like to try and live a life without having to lie. It would also seem as though this ‘process’ is also set up to ‘twist the knife’ by penalising those who are unfortunately naive enough (or stupid enough in my case) to walk blindly into this counter-intuitive and ultimately ridiculous process. So…’play the game’, give them what they want, do what you want, try and make sure you cover yourself and are not unmasked until such time that you either die, or retire, or find a mcJob, or if you are really lucky, start to stand/land on your feet and turn a dream into a reality, but, just as long as, in the meantime, you keep schtum.
I suppose I’m asking if it’s reasonable expectation. If I’m being too, too naive? Or just barking wildly at the moon? (As if the moon is really going to give much thought to my barking at it. It’s still a fun thing to do sometimes) Maybe I’ll just go back to them, change a couple of details, and wait to see what happens. After all it’s only a legal declaration and changing a legal declaration can’t be too problematic can it? Especially when it’s a contradictory, self-defeating and possibly misguidedly oppressive one. I should be worried about oppression? It’s not as if I’m living in some sort of overtly oppressive regime unlike some unfortunate souls who have put their lives on the line, is it.
If you’ve got this far thanks for reading.
If you’ve skipped some of it thanks for reading some of it.
If you’ve scanned it for its salient points I’d suggest a career in law.
If you’re now thinking I’m a navel gazing, self-obsessed d*ck with outdated and archaic expectations you’re probably right, but hey it doesn’t necessarily mean I’m wrong either.
Peace, love and good happiness stuff especially to L as she has been more than patient with some of the crap that’s been sifted though over the last 12 months. I don’t think I’d have had the depth of being to be able to do so.
This message is designed to publish itself in 12 hours to give me time to reconsider if its really a good idea to admit to.
…damn…too late…
…pressed the wrong button…
…c’est la vie…
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