Breaking Up the Stag Party

Guys have life a little easier in a lot of ways. And, very often, I find myself frustrated with the nagging feeling that my gender is holding me back. If I were a guy I could be funnier. If I were a guy it would be easier to find a decent paying skilled labor job instead of temping. If I were a guy my body type wouldn't affect people's impressions of me as much. I realize this sounds like I am using gender as a convenient scapegoat for my problems. I am. Because it is. It affects me adversely, and I resent it. So there.

This issue is coming to a head today for me because I think I have decided what career track I'd like to pursue. It's not an easy one, but given my history as a photographer, affinity for dorky technical crap, and cavalier attitude it is kind of a predictable one. My inflated self-importance alone (you know you love me) might actually qualify me for membership in the Local 600 (ba-dum-bump!). I wanna work in camera!

Now this sure enough isn't 100%. I don't know if I will like it if I actually try it...but I do want to try.

Here's where the guy thing comes in. I feel like--by virtue of being an emotional girl who likes skirts and long hair and lip gloss--it will be extra hard to find my place in the boys club that is the camera department. They are as notorious for their chauvanistic egos as they are for their technical knowledge. To work in camera you have to be strong--literally. You must be able to carry around equipment that is delicate, expensive, and very heavy. Less upper body strength because of gender is not an excuse--you must be strong enough to do the job. You cannot be clumsy. You cannot mess up. Shooting on film costs an extravagant amount of money; if the camera department messes up, everyone has a setback.

You can't make a motion picture without pictures, so yeah, they're cocky. I don't blame them one bit. What they do is so cool.

Here are my hangups:

• I don't really want to be a D.P., which is the head of camera and pretty much the desired end of that career track for most people.
• I am kind of a klutz, and when I'm nervous (like, say, about loading wrong and wasting hundreds of feet of film and tons of time and buckets of money) it gets worse.
  
• I cry sometimes and I like dressing pretty; I can't really do either of those things if I want to be taken seriously and work in the camera department.
  
• I may have to give up socializing with people, except for people I'm working with. This includes dating, which is hard enough as it is.
  
• I will probably have to continue getting paid the same crappy wage I'm making now for some time before I can get a job as a loader. This sucks because I would like to be able to afford a decent apartment someday.
  
• Although I will learn lots of things that could help me with my Big Idea, I probably will not have the time or energy to pursue the Big Idea. And the Big Idea is probably my best shot at any kind of fame or fortune, however limited.
  
• If I try and decide I don't want to keep doing it I can try something else, but how much time will I have wasted then?
  
• If I try it and switch to something else I will always feel like I couldn't hack it.
• If I try it and switch to something else other people will probably think I couldn't hack it.

Yeah yeah, I know what you're thinking. You think it doesn't matter what other people think. You know what? You're wrong! This business is all about what other people think! In fact, just getting a job relies almost exclusively on other people thinking you're really good at the thing you want to do. So it does matter. It totally does.

So the next step? Get on set. Start nosing around a little. Get on set. Talk to people. Get on set.

I'm working on it...!