Simone

In fifth grade, the class bully told me he saw me working in a cubicle in the future.

Normally, I would’ve written this off, because fifth graders generally don’t have much sense when it comes to gauging career success or making predictions. But this boy was really smart for his age, and completely aware of the insult embedded in that statement. He wasn’t saying I’d work in a cubicle because he couldn’t think of any other jobs, he was saying it because he knew I had creative dreams, and like I said, he was the class bully.

I have since decided that I will never, ever, ever work in a cubicle. I know I sound horribly privileged saying this. I know I also sound naive. I am well aware that I will leave college with student debt, and probably propel myself into our capitalist society’s cyclical (but dead-end) workforce before I am ready to make a decision about who or what I want to be. I know this will involve cubicles. But right now, I am blinded by the non-reality of my career prospects. Anything seems possible. It is very easy for me to believe that in five years, and 10 years, and 10 years after that, I will be in the socio-economic position to work creatively and live comfortably doing so.

The fruits of my creativity need to be integrous too.

That’s what makes the cubicle certain.

A few days ago, watching the product advertisements that precede film advertisements at the movie theater, it all came back to me. There was an ad for a children’s book series. It was the story of dragons and elves and other presumably magic and medieval things that kids sometimes like. It looked like a fun story, the kind of reading I might have appreciated had I been a bit more nerdy at eight. But, as the advertisement informed me, the story was enhanced by its digital features. It was to be read with an electronic pen. The pen could also project hologram-like images of the characters in the story, most notably that of a two-headed dragon. This book wasn’t so much a literary work, as an online toy. The cover was revealed, and I took note of the author’s name. It was one of those “I want to sound like I was born during the era in which my story takes place” young adult author pseudonyms.

Not only did I wonder to myself what boring name this author really had, but how they felt about the decimation of their work. What the meeting was like when their publisher sat them down and explained, “We really like this, but what if we gave it some Nintendo flare?” That must’ve been terrible. I wouldn’t have been able to handle it. I remembered Charlize Theron’s character in Young Adult. The emotional immaturity founded in feelings of deep-rooted inadequacy, the spiritual distance in all of her human interactions. Was this the inevitable experience of writing commercial literature under a pen name? Was this what it was like to sell out?

The next day, it was the classically trained cellists backing the Jonas Brothers in a rendition of “How We Roll” in their 2008 3D concert film. I watched the entire thing, and found JB’s classical ensemble utilized for a total of 45 seconds, spending the rest of the concert clapping above their heads to the rhythm of Joe Jonas’ tambourine. It made me sad. I wondered if they invited their conservatory mentors to the show.

Is this another cubicle? One less overtly square, but a cubicle nonetheless?

I thought back to why I wasn’t all that mad at Ryan Gosling in La La Land. He just wanted to offer Emma Stone stability, even if it meant sacrificing his traditionalist view of jazz to join a band that personified the very change he fought against. And it was OK. He was making money for making art.

Of course, the value of his art was subjective. But money is money is money. ♦