The day before the inauguration, a dear friend made the same suggestion to me that dozens have before. "Why don't you just take your master's off your resume? It might be easier to find work."
In the past, this suggestion brought up deep shame. I often thought people were basically right -- that my Master's of Music in historical musicology from Royal Holloway, University of London was impeding a serious general American job hunt -- but I couldn't quite bring myself to omit it. This time, however (was it the stress of current events?), I uncharacteristically almost shouted, "No! I am not taking the one achievement I am truly proud of off my resume!" and stomped away. I should have apologized to my friend but darn it, on top of everything, I'm so tired of apologizing.
For "American Liz", this degree has been the elephant in the living room from the get-go. From the moment I returned from London in 1981 and my mother said, "Did you have a nice time dear? What are you going to do next?", my M.Mus has been in the category of "that weird thing Liz did that we totally don't understand". It was devastating on a personal level not to be asked by most friends or family what my experience (research in the UK and France, writing, transcribing chant, and singing) had entailed. But at least in the corporate world at the time, human beings read resumes, and it was possible to get a job such as the one I had with Time, answering letters to the editor. My degree showed that I was bright, resourceful, a good researcher, and articulate. Unfortunately, as I moved forward, it took me too long to grasp that computers had begun to do the human resource scanning, and that they were literally not registering "M.Mus", "historical musicology", or "Royal Holloway". I was getting tossed from the get-go. Just to survive, I fell back on retail, waitressing, and odd jobs, so the chasm between my education/intellectual potential and my actual work experience was so deep that, as I may have said in a past blog, even I would not have hired me. The "ifs" haunt me here too. If I hadn't been drowning in student loans, maybe I would have tried to stay in London. If I had stayed in London, my degree would have opened doors. If I had chosen a more academic direction or to be an arts administrator, if, if, if...
At almost-61 with years of insignificant income behind me, you'd think I would be more open to my friend's suggestion rather than less. But I am not. Quite the contrary. It is too unbearable, this metaphor of self-annihilation at a moment when all my personal values seem to be at risk of annihilation from the outside.
So I am proposing two new versions of my resume going forward.
A.
Liz Wilson
Master of Music (historical musicology/chant)
Royal Holloway, University of London
B.
Liz Wilson
Mystic Queen
Singer of Choral Evensong
Visionary
Artist
Writer
Depending on the situation, I'll use A or B. When I am feeling really feisty, I'll put the words "Get over it" at the bottom of the page. Period. Full Stop.
(Is that the Hallelujah Chorus I hear wafting on the breeze?!)
