I can’t believe I’m saying this, but there’s a possibility I have too many jobs.
The pandemic has left me fearful for when my next job will be in a way that I’ve never experienced before; I have said no to exactly one project since 2020 began.
Granted, this doesn’t take into account what I’ve decided not to pitch or apply for, but you feel me.
I keep a detailed spreadsheet that outlines all of my projects, and moves each title from a series of statuses from pitched to paid. This “Active Projects” sheet, as I call it, references another one that details every publication I’ve ever pitched, or may want to pitch. In March of 2020, I added a column to the latter, with a simple check-box in the field. “On Hold,” it read. And I only deleted it recently.
Recently, I’ve been positively be-fucked with work, to the point where even these 15 minute missives can fall off completely if I get so much as a cold.
I’m sure you’re hearing the part within this where I mildly apologize for not writing this last week. Because, yes, I had a cold. Don’t worry: it wasn’t Corona. I’m perfectly fine (and double vaxxed I should add, soon to be triple.)
Look, I know we’re still very much in the throws of the pandemic. You can see evidence of that everywhere: still rising case numbers, the mask wearing, even me trying to schedule my life and travels around getting my booster shot in Belgrade in November. But for me, my “work pandemic” seems to be waning dramatically.
And I’m saying this because I just, out of sheer habit, applied for two more contributor positions I happened across, and only after I sent them all my info realized that I don’t really think I have time for these at all.
Unless.
See, leverage isn’t really something that travel writers have been privy to during the pandemic. And now that getting it back is looming on the horizon, my mind is positively racing with the possibilities of free time filled with leisure and expensive destinations.
The first of which is coming up soon; this years birthday trip kicks off from Istanbul on the 22nd, inshallah.
We’ll see how this all goes.
–M