As most normal twenty-something arts graduates, my response to ‘I wish’ would be to write something along the well-trodden lines of recent government funding cuts to the much needed and highly overlooked arts sector. After graduating from a dance degree, you don’t just have to answer to those people with the cynical comments, disparaging looks and turned up noses at your seemingly worthless arts degree, you also have to face up to the harshly naked fact that these people may in fact be right. It’s a slow and horrible dawning that has been hanging, putrid in the air over your head through your last few months at University, only to reveal itself now in its brutal and horribly real form. A realisation that the world of candy canes, gingerbread men and arts jobs that flourish from trees is simply the result of rose-tinted glasses. The problem is that most people know this, but are too passionate (some might say naive) to give up on their art completely and find a ‘proper’ job. But, all this has been said before. ‘I wish for a job’ isn’t going to cut it. I wish doesn’t mean I get. So, I’m going to flip the scripts. There’s a certain art in being able to see a little silver lining in that terrible head-cloud, and I think I may have mastered it. Constantly wishing after anything can have disastrous affect s; it can encompass your every being, take over your mind and soul, it is all expansive and incredibly exhausting. This is why I have stopped wishing. I’ve come to the realisation that all this struggle, debt, pure and unashamed poverty; questioning every life decision I have ever made and failing to establish the core to my very existence, is actually a good thing. If, the moment I graduated, the perfect job grew extremities and rushed to meet me with a warm embrace at my front door, I wouldn’t appreciate it half as much. Feeling like I’m struggling, head strong into gale force wind, wayward leaves and shrubbery getting stuck in my hair, bits of people’s letters (probably hefty bank statements and interview invites) flitter mockingly at my face, I can safely say when I get that job I will be pleased to have worked for it. I will never compromise my art. And having experienced stark career poverty, I’m all the more determined.
