The Side Gig

I write, but I also teach.

Though I did not go to college to get an educational degree, I teach online ESL to students in China. I have to keep odd hours, opening class slots for children from 8:30 p.m. to 11:30 p.m., and from 6 a.m. to 10 a.m. I spend 25 minutes each class with one student focusing on a different subject or set of words.

Ever since the pandemic started, online ESL has been a bigger portion of my life than writing, both in terms of time taken and total income. Freelance journalism opportunities have been few and far between. The Jewelry of Grace has had some success, but not the consistency of my teaching.

My primary work changed. Which means my side-gig changed.

when I first started teaching online ESL, that was supposed to be the side gig. It would fill in the gaps before my first book, The Pride of Central, was released, and help whenever there was a gap of a couple of weeks between freelancing.

The era of COVID changed that. I went 15 months without an author signing, and covered a grand total of nine events for newspapers in that same span. Though I did complete and publish my second novel in that time frame as well, there was no question that the overall focus of my work life was on ESL.

In some ways, that can be disappointing. Writers write. Many of us want the writing to be the primary work of our lives. If it is the side gig, it is because we can't make life work financially otherwise.

I was able to make writing my primary work - mostly the journalistic aspect of it - but it appears in this current environment, that can no longer be the case. Oh, I'm not stopping - I hope to cover more baseball this summer, more football this fall, and have a third book out in two years. But ESL will have to be my work focus for the foreseeable future.

Some writers who have stumbled across my blog are facing the same thing. Possibly due to shutdowns, possibly for other reasons, you are finding that writing can no longer be your main focus. Or you had hoped that one day you could make writing the top priority, but now that no longer seems possible.

It's disappointing. But it does not have to be devastating.

Because a side gig is still a gig.

You still get to write. You still get to express your ideas. The time it takes or the money it makes may not be as appealing as it was when you first started, or may never be what you wished they were.

But when that first book is published, be it three or seven years from now, it won't make that much difference that it took more time. Reaching the goal of your side gig will be no less rewarding.

Next week: Keeping your focus