Dick Williams is 90-something years old and still writing books, documenting over 50 years of professional experience as an architect, landscape architect and teacher (among many other things I’m sure). He had us (my design partner and I) over for drinks (something involving soda water, vodka and orange flavored Metamucil I think) a couple weeks ago as school ended in Tucson. Carol and I had won a design competition that he sponsored and he wanted to talk to us about our aspirations and future. Partly because he is a bit deaf and partly because he really enjoyed bestowing his own advice upon us, we listened to Dick’s forecast of the profession. Dick said that he too graduated during a recession, the Great Depression (we haven’t yet reached the “capital” D or gained a “Great” like the Great Wall or New Zealand’s Great Walks) and he thought this was a good thing. In my anticipation of being done with school and the responsibilities of life (credit card payments without student loans, a mortgage, eating three meals a day without an income) not yet sinking in fully, I had also formulated why this recession seemed to be good for us. Dick’s reiteration was comforting. The recession is forcing us to live more modestly, think about the essentials in life, refocus on what really matters, be less consumptive which trickles down to destroying less of our natural spaces, throwing less away and driving less. It means (more concretely for our profession) that the focus of projects will shift heavily away from private projects (ie: “new community projects”, a euphemism for “big subdivision sprawl”) to public projects and infill projects. Even though my only job prospect at the time was to keep my bartending job at the Rialto Theatre, the fact that Dick has a beautiful house in a classy neighborhood in Tucson made me think long-term poverty wasn’t going to befall me. I mean, he weathered the Great Depression and this was still just a little “r” recession.
I packed my truck about two weeks later, rented out my room to cover most of my mortgage and headed north to spend the summer visiting friends and firms, without huge expectations and luckily without any responsibilities except myself to sustain. I sold most of my clothes, packed away some in bins and felt even a bit lucky that I wasn’t choosing between many labor hungry firms throwing cushy salaries at me. This was a time to travel and look leisurely at places, firms and organizations. I took my computer, an electronic version of my portfolio, my resume and writing samples.
Lake Tahoe, CA
As I jump back into a job search again (I have to take it in spurts or risk getting totally jaded) and just thought i'd give ASLA's joblink a gander. I entered what i thought were loose search terms. "landscape architect", "entry level", ANY state. "Sorry, no records found".
Hmmm... boys and girls, I think we are up sh*# creek without a paddle. I mean, we are going to have to really get creative on this hunt. I am thinking of starting my own greeting card business with "hope your job search goes well" or "sympathy on your unemployment" or the rare but jubilant "congratulations on getting a job!" focus. My "to do" list includes regions to explore (exciting) and bills and real-world tasks to stay on top of (not so exciting), and writing this blog which has become the highlight of my job search. I'm just afraid that no one wants to hear me rant or sling sarcastic comments about consistent rejection. I did get some encouraging advice from Issac, a construction worker in NM who said that a job agency in Taos is looking for servers and hospitality (read: toilet bowl cleaners) at the ski resort for the winter. He said it with such sincerity for my well being that I had to seem interested for his sake. So with those prospects my strategy is to look not to MAKING money but saving it. A friend from grad school is moving into my house. I moved into my car. My car moved to Tahoe, soon to Montana. I eat PB and J for 2 of three meals.
I'm trying to think of other ways to capitalize on the "recession" a la the Great Depression. Maybe I can take forlorn photos of myself like Dorthea Lange did of DustBowl farmers. I need some children...
Naw... see, the sarcasm is getting the better of me. I just got off the Selway and Payette Rivers in ID and am hanging out with a friend in Tahoe (not a shabby place to be sipping coffee and job searching). I do miss the monsoons and friends in Tucson, though.
The Forest Service, Tahoe Basin
D.C. (I'm not going to use their names - I am not sure how they'd feel about that) is a cool dude. He wore a California style berret. He likes to mountain bike. He said he started his career in small firms in southern California and then moved to the Forest Service. I had found a Forest Service listing for Tahoe and quickly applied for it. D.C. said, unfortunately the position was a "detail" and thus I wasn't eligible. But, like other LAs who seem genuinely interested in talking to me about strategies to get a job, we talked about the best way to get a foot in the door. He suggested applying for internships. The Forest Service has an internship program called the Career Ladder Internship Program. As our talk moved towards the best mountain bike trails in the area and his new bike I realized how important that personal connection is. There may not be a job now... but when there is, hopefully D.C. will remember what a cool, hip, qualified, motivated person I am. Being just another portfolio on CD on a desk does very little good, it seems.
Sacramento, CA
Tahoe was 75 degrees. Highway 50 to Sacramento was glutted with heading-home Bay area tourists. Sacramento was 98. My AC makes my car overheat so I turned it on while going downhill, off while going uphill or in traffic. I changed from my longish sleeve black “interview top” which was quickly getting sweaty, into a tank top at a traffic light in Placerville. I changed back while ducking behind my car door at the EDAW parking lot. Lesson 1: If presentation matters (which everyone says it does), don’t interview in the summer in hot California valley towns. I looked like I had just gone for a run.
J.Z. is a senior LA at EDAW-Sacramento. He invited me down to review my portfolio and talk job-acquisition-strategy. I was appreciative since he too said, yup, they aren’t hiring. In fact, they have consolidated their staff. But he believes that the downturn will only last a couple more months. Then they will be hiring.
He liked my portfolio. He talked about the niche that he heads in the company – landscape restoration and recreation projects. EDAW is a big place. It had three secretaries and most folks sat in cubicles. But John was down to earth as were the other LAs I met. The restoration projects posted on the wall were interesting and I felt like this was an arena I knew little about but was excited at the prospect of learning. The planning studio, run by another man, did urban design projects (more familiar to me). The California transit line that will eventually connect northern and southern CA (neat), some high profile public plaza spaces, a new city in Vietnam which looked like a modern, gridded Versaille in plan (who knows what the landscape originally looked like. I imagined Vietnamese rice paddies, square in shape but essentially a productive wetland… and sadly the man who was working on it said he’d never been to Vietnam but had heard about it from his boss). My five minute exposure to the project surely does not allow me to understand it fully. I am woo-ed, I admit, by the travel opportunities, the cool perspectives of high rises and French curve green spaces and an Asian aesthetic crispness and willingness to go big or go home… and yet it sent a shiver down my spine. It made me wonder if, for the sake of a being employed and making my mortgage, I’d take a job that asked me to plat out cul-de-sacs in the desert or grid a wetland (with environmental rationalization of course. But it’s this rationalization I find dangerous). I’ve been told over and over that these types of projects are the bread and butter of many firms. We can’t all work on public greenway projects. But I have a mortgage (did I mention that yet?)
Only a week in California and ALL my job prospects were ones that I heard about through connections I had made through friends and friends of friends. Lesson - make ANY connection possible. GO in. MEET. MAKE an impression. GIVE them something to remember you by (something that makes you distinctive). KEEP in touch afterwards.
I changed back into my tank top at a gas station next to I-80 and headed north towards Idaho. Boise seems like a cool town.
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