B.W.'s Book Report: "How to Kill the Job Culture Before It Kills You" by Claire Wolfe

I ordered Claire Wolfe's book from Loompanics seven minutes after I learned it existed. That's how ready I was for it.

Late in the book, when she repeated the James Madison assertion that "[t]he class of citizens, who provide at once their own food and their own raiment, may be viewed as the most truly independent and happy," my mind wandered and the vegetable garden I intend to plant next spring gained a brother goal: I started thinking it might be fun to learn how to make my own clothes, and thus provide both my own sweet corn and my own "raiment." All of the potential money-making and money-saving ideas I've ever had, crazy and/or achievable, strolled in and out of my consciousness as I raced through the pages. I can't imagine someone reading this book without his/her mind starting to wander outside the box like that.

The book's subtitle offers the modern dream: "Living a life of autonomy in a wage-slave society." No, that's not true. That subtitle offers my dream: Suggesting that any dream is universal sends us down the path to totalitarianism, no matter how well-intended. Many people are content and comfortable as wage slaves; some even thrive in that environment. Wolfe's book is directed toward folks like me, who want to own ourselves again ... or perhaps own ourselves for the first time.

Wolfe, as my two (three? more?) regular readers know, has gloriously moved beyond wage slavery and, to me at least, is one of the foremost proponents of living one's own life. A slim volume at 140 pages, the book is packed full of information and practical advice about "why jobs suck (the vitality out of life)" and how to plan your escape - but not spend so much time planning that you never get started. She sounds a lot like me - easily distracted, the world's greatest procrastinator - and so a life of autonomy seems within reach because she has achieved such a life. It ain't always glorious, but it's autonomous.

There are lots of thought-starters sprinkled here and there and one solid set of "twelve tips for springing the job trap." The tips gave me some resolve for moving forward, but tip No. 11 may be the soundest advice of all: "Don't burn your bridges." You may be fed up with corporate life, but the real people you know and love within that corporation don't have to go away when you split; in fact, they may be your future clients. Wolfe says she's held three "job-jobs" in her life, gaining something valuable from each, and when she moved on, "in each case, one of the prime values was that I gained a client for my freelance work."

Once upon a time, holding a job-job was not the norm, she writes; in fact, job-jobs are largely a creation of the Industrial Revolution and the need to plug people into machines. Such a time may come again someday, and this little book shows a clear path in that direction, one individual at a time.

Order it for $12.95 plus shipping from http://www.loompanics.com/ or by calling 1-360-385-2230. If you still need convincing, she wrote a nifty summary of the book's themes for the Loompanics Unlimited catalog here.