The Vine: March 16, 2005
Hey, Sars,
I read the last letter of yesterday’s Vine with interest, because it pertains to
my own career. Your advice to Beer was certainly correct, as far as it
went, but I think there may be a couple of additional pieces of data she
should know. I don’t know what this six-week course is about, exactly — it
seems like it would be training in copyediting, although I’m not sure what
sort of portfolio you’d get out of that. I hired freelance copyeditors for
my employers for years, and none of them ever had a portfolio — if they
passed my written test, I hired them. Anyway, I think that formal training
for copyeditors is a great idea, but it may not lead to the career that Beer
is looking for.
First, very few publishers that I’m aware of use full-time copyeditors (I’ve
worked in academic and trade publishing). With one exception, every place
I’ve worked has used freelancers. From where I’m sitting, a career in
copyediting is a career in freelancing, and Beer specifically said she
didn’t want that.
Second, Beer said she wasn’t interested in fetching coffee for anybody. In
my experience, publishing is an old-style apprenticeship system — you start
out by fetching coffee, keep your ears open so you can learn how the place
works, take the opportunities that come your way, and move up from there.
It took me a couple of years, and the pay was crappy, but I got to edit
books on my own eventually, and I was a better editor for my apprenticeship.
I admit that I was much more willing to “pay my dues” at 22 than I would be
if I were starting out now, but age doesn’t entitle you to career shortcuts
— experience does.
As you said, if the program is really good on placements, it may not be that
much of a risk, and without knowing more about it, it’s hard to say for
certain, but I suspect Beer is going to finish this program looking at a
choice between being a freelancer or an editorial assistant.
Sincerely,
B
Dear B,
I got several letters that said more or less the same thing — that a course like this would make it easier to get a job, but not jump you ahead in the queue w/r/t the job itself.
There really aren’t any shortcuts. As in most industries, regardless of natural ability, you have to do the dues-paying at the beginning. And the thing is, nobody wants to fetch coffee and answer phones; I mean, duh. Nobody has ever entered any industry with that as their long-term goal or dream job. But thinking you’re too good for the work, whatever the work is, isn’t going to get you anywhere.
And now, an elaboration on the letter from KL.
I was taught that, in formal writing, “than” took a subjective pronoun. But reader LB pointed me to a Safire column in which he mentioned that it’s now acceptable to treat “than” as a preposition — which therefore takes an objective pronoun:
When no verb follows, I say it’s a prepositional dessert topping,
period. (And if you’ve seen one dessert topping, you’ve seen ’em all.)
Tradition in grammar is to be treated with great respect, but dealing
with the language is like the old saying about having an elephant on a
string: When the elephant wants to run, better let him run. (And nobody
hates to cave in more than me.)
Garner acknowledges Safire’s position, but still feels that, in formal writing, it’s best to stick with the more traditional usage of “than” as a conjunction — and I agree, for safety’s sake, that it’s better to use the implied-verb rule than to have to get into a debate about what part of speech the word is. But I would also venture that, in colloquial dialogue, it’s not worth correcting people who go with an objective pronoun.
Garner also points out that the prepositional usage was favored by Milton. You can take that any way you like; it’s my feeling that that’s a point in its favor.
Hi Sars,
I finally have something I’d really like your views on. (Bit long,
there’s a bit of back story.)
Husband has a friend he met through work, who, over the space of a couple
of years, has proved to be a fairly irritating person. Insists on trying
to be funny when he isn’t, that kind of thing (really forces it). He also
goes through girlfriends, obtained via internet dating sites, like other
people go through — perhaps not underpants, but certainly fairly quickly.
There’s nothing inherently wrong with that, but every time he starts a new
relationship, it’s the best thing ever, and we’re getting married, and
blah blah blah insincere-cakes.
The next to most recent of these was with a woman who has a two-year-old
son. They moved in together after about three months, then some eight
weeks later he ended it by getting up on a Sunday morning, saying “this
isn’t working for me” and moving out. Then and there. Lovely stuff,
leaving the son asking “where’s Daddy, where’s Daddy” for some months
afterwards.
So, here we are, he split with the previous one only four months ago, and
hey presto we get the phone call: “I’m getting married.” To a new one.
The wedding invite showed up today. He came to our wedding last spring, and
bought us a fabulous present, so I feel some kind of obligation.
He can’t have been seeing this one for more than twelve weeks AND she
lives in another state, so it’s been weekends only.
I’m a bit disgusted with the whole thing. Husband has said he’ll go on
his own if I really don’t want to go, but I’m not sure about doing that,
either. I think attendance does imply you approve of the relationship,
though, but I’m not sure how nice it would be to show up and act as
cynical as I feel.
What would you do?
Should I stay or should I go now?
Dear Is There Open Bar?,
Many wedding ceremonies contain a sequence in which the congregation is charged with supporting the union — which you do implicitly, by showing up, I guess, but I’ve always liked that part, where the community’s like, “Looks good to us, chief.” But with that said, I don’t think that attending a wedding for which you don’t have the highest hopes of success is, like, legally binding, or hypocritical. If you were in the wedding party, or were the maid of honor, then I think your responsibility to the union itself is a little bit deeper…but you aren’t.
That part aside, I think you’re also concerned about attending when you feel you might behave…snidely, I guess is the word. And that’s not on. I mean, I don’t disagree with you that this marriage is probably not headed for Newman-Woodward territory, but…nobody asked you, and if you go to the wedding itself, you need to smile big, congratulate the couple, and just be a good guest. And if you feel you can’t do that, because you don’t like the guy or don’t approve or whatever, you ought to stay home.
It’s your call. Frankly, I’d wait until the last moment to RSVP and see if it’s actually going to happen, but if you can’t fake making nice, don’t go.
Hi Sars,
I have a problem. I may have been rude.
I’m attending an out-of-state wedding in a few weeks.
Since learning about this wedding, I’ve been planning
to travel down with some other attendees and stay in a
motel room together for the weekend. I’ve been in
contact with these attendees since hatching this plan,
and last week the room was booked, and all was well.
My boyfriend, who is not attending the wedding, is
from the city in which the wedding is taking place,
and his family still lives there. The day after we
confirmed our booking in the motel, my boyfriend told
me that his family has invited me to stay at their
house while I’m in town. “Oh, wow,” I said, “that’s
really nice of them. But I’ve already booked the room
with my friends. What a shame.” He looked surprised,
and then told me that they were offering to put me up,
feed me, and drive me around, and I could save a lot
of money. I told him again that the room had already
been booked, and the plan was set. I then asked him if
I could have his mother’s email address so that I
could thank her for the offer and explain why I
couldn’t stay with them.
There was a bit more
back-and-forth, with him telling me how much money I
could save; eventually he got angry, and told me I was
being very rude and insulting to him and his family.
He wouldn’t give me his mother’s email address,
giving me the impression that if I were to write her,
she would get very upset. He told me he’d call her and
tell her himself, but he hasn’t done so yet.
I’ve always thought that it was very rude —
unacceptable, even — to change plans on other people
once a better offer comes along. My friends and I have
been making plans for this trip for several weeks now,
and I would feel really awful pulling out now because
I’ve found something cheaper. But, of course, I
certainly don’t want to insult my boyfriend or his
family. I genuinely do appreciate their generous
offer, but…I’ve already made plans!
I’m looking for a neutral opinion here, Sars. What’s
the polite thing to do?
Thanks,
Gladly Accept or Regretfully Decline?
Dear Eesh,
Well, there’s what’s polite, and there’s what’s going to save you aggro, and I don’t think those two are the same in this situation.
Because I’m with you. You made a commitment with the motel room, and it would be rude, and a hassle to the others, to back out of it now. And frankly I think your boyfriend is being really weird and controlling about this issue — I mean, he says his mother will be totally insulted, but it reads to me like he’s the one who’s insulted, and feeling left out because he’s not going to the wedding, because if it’s really his mom’s issue, why wouldn’t he just give you her email and let the two of you sort it out? Because it’s not his mom, obviously. It’s him. I wouldn’t be surprised if his family were like, “…She’s invited to stay? Okay, whatever.”
I think that, if it were a situation where your in-laws were being rigid, your friends would understand that, this one time, you’d have to change your plans — although I would offer to pay for my portion of the room anyway so as not to screw anyone over financially. But I really think you need to have a talk with your boyfriend and get this squared away, because…he’s being a baby and using his family to manipulate you, and I really think it’s not about his family. It’s about him needing you time on a weekend that he’s not involved in, and being a child about asking for it, and if I’m right about that, I wouldn’t give in to that because it sets a bad precedent.
Find out what’s really going on. This isn’t about accommodations, and if it is, your boyfriend might try…being accommodating instead of bratty. Just saying.
Hey Sars!
I was reading some vintage Vines earlier today, and I
came across the
letter
from B who was dealing with the
socially retarded guy.
You
mentioned that you have had some experience with a guy
who had
Asperger’s
syndrome, and I was wondering if you could help me.
My
boyfriend
recently
discovered the disease Asperger’s, and after
twenty-four years of being
diagnosed with learning disabilities and poor social
skills (resulting
in
him flunking out of high school) he really, really
identifies with the
characteristics of Asperger’s and his doctors have
confirmed he has the
gene
for it.
It was hard for me to grasp at first (“You do
NOT have
autism!”)
but I definitely see the symptoms of it in him now.
The things that
used to
drive me bonkers about him (his talking AT me, not to
me, loudly
dominating
any conversation, talking about himself constantly)
aren’t just
personality
flaws, but part of this disease.
I’m really confused,
though, because I
don’t
know how to handle it. He was diagnosed so late in his
life that while
he
knows he has it, I think he feels like he’s sort of
conquered most of
it.
Because he isn’t like the guy B was having problems
with. For the most
part,
he can function pretty well. But I notice the
Asperger’s in him a lot.
I
notice him dominating conversations and repeating
himself and generally
having bad social skills. And I’m not sure what to do
about it.
I
think if
I tried to bring it up he would think I was
criticizing him, his
personality, and how he interacts with people. I think
he feels like
he’s
learned how to interact with people in spite of having
Asperger’s, but
I
really think he still has a way to go. So I don’t know
what to do. I’m
probably going to marry this man, but I don’t know if
I should
interfere
with what he has going and try and talk to him about
it, and I don’t
know if
I should try and help him develop social skills or
what.
So I was
wondering
about your experience with Asperger’s, and if you
think I should bring
his
lack of social skills up, hurting him be damned.
Thank you,
Unsure
Dear Unsure,
If it’s the way he relates to you that’s bothersome, yes, I think you should bring it up — making sure to couch it in terms of how you would prefer this and you feel that, so as not to hurt his feelings. But if other people are finding him off-putting, that’s really on them to deal with, or not, as they see fit. I don’t think you can really shepherd him in that area unless it’s about his interactions with you, or you risk taking on a mother role that isn’t appropriate and is going to exhaust you anyway.
Managing the syndrome is his job. The way he does that is important to you, of course, but you have to come to it from your own standpoint and not try to “fix” his behavior or “teach” him social skills. I mean, pointing out that he’s behaving insensitively towards you is fine; you’d do that anyway. But it’s on him to cope with the Asperger’s, generally. If he’s not coping, well, that’s another conversation, but this is his to deal with, and you have to let him.
Tags: boys (and girls) etiquette friendships the fam workplace
