Husband said that I could say I’d retrained to be a technical writer, which is sort of true. (He’s not a good source of career lingo, though. Apparently, when asked as a very young lad what he wanted to be when he grew up, he said, “Retired.”) In a handy twist, I actually like working as a tech writer, but it’s not clear to me if I like the work or I like the independence that it affords me—its perfect freelance work and means I have plenty of time to not work, too.
If I had to pick a profession now, it would be something like “Going places, looking at stuff, taking pictures, and writing some things down.” I could totally be a professional vacationer. Though there’s something specific about vacationing that implies flights, hotels, and sightseeing guides, which is not what I mean at all.
I’m quite skilled at squandering vast amounts of time on leisure activities, hiking, and reading, to name two, but there is no profession for those things. I think I could be quite a good professional blogger too, but Nerd’s Eye View refuses to cough up any sort of income.
This “von Beruf” thing has made me thankful that my identity is not tied up in my profession, because I would find it confusing and probably very disappointing. I don’t work in my field of study, and I lack credentials for the work I do to make a living. Plus, the stuff I want to do isn’t really an occupation or a profession. Though I think the French have a very nice word for it: Flaneuse. That’s the female version of flaneur, a person who swans about doing, well, not all that much really. Hanging about in cafes, admiring the landscape, maybe scribbling self-indulgent multi-lingual thoughts in a journal. This is something I’ve been training for my entire life.
Ich bin Flaneuse von Beruf. Yup. That sounds about right.
