Eva the Uninsulted

After criticizing Gerald’s career plans and making a joke about Duncan’s open door policy, Eva Abuya gets away unscathed from the punning eye of April Patterson. Eva likes to sing, but does not plan to be a professional singer, so she has escaped the anti-professional musician wrath April levied against Gerald and Becky. So, instead Eva plans to take general arts as a starting point. I remember back when I was first entering college back in 1980, this was pretty standard advice from a high school counselor (at least from mine). I consider it to be pretty bad advice.

Ironically, at my company, this Thursday is the “Take Your Kids to Work” day. I will be taking both my girl and my boy to see what glorious careers could be awaiting them. I have done this with my kids as soon as they were considered eligible to go. They enjoy it for the free company products they get (i.e. leftover customer giveaways); but I have been impressed in the past with the setups which have been in place to actually help kids decide (or at least be aware) of jobs which closely match their interests. I remember being surprised at how many careers there were with good-paying jobs for person who found art or the arts interesting, many of which were not inherently obvious and also pay pretty well. If I were to speak to Eva, I would suggest talking to a modern career counselor (and not a 60-year-old cartoonist) about which of those careers might interest her, in order to better focus her university choices.

However, if Eva just likes to sing, there is another way. My personal role model was the famous 20th century American Charles Ives. He is known for being a music composer and an insurance salesman. Charles Ives made his money selling insurance and this allowed him the leisure to compose music. In this same fashion, I sing in the Tucson Symphony Orchestra Chorus and in my own church choir, but I do not make a living as a professional singer. My living allows me the luxury of being able to participate in the chorus.

Duncan’s last comment is interesting. People often do end up doing something completely different from anything they planned. One of the main reasons for this is the need to have a job which makes money. Money may not buy happiness, but a good salary certainly keeps happiness close by. One of the primary ways people choose a career is by saying, “Where is the job growth going to be?” and picking a career based on that. When I went to university, the money majors were computers, accounting, pre-med, and business. Computers and pre-med were considered the 2 toughest choices. The president of the Business School at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, at the time, was known for a joke he made, where he thanked the Chemistry (required for pre-med) teacher for the first year students for sending him so many students.

I also enjoy the irony of Duncan’s final statement. So much about For Better or For Worse is about the characters doing something exactly the way they imagined, completely without variation. They have been so exact, it has been painfully predictable and imminently snarkable. Based on this week’s strips I could see Duncan Anderson as a travel agency owner who dabbles in organizing worldwide sporting events, helped out by his wife Eva, who sings the National Anthem at those sporting events, when she is not raising their children. April is going to be a veterinarian, living in Milborough, married to Gerald, with 2 children of her own, and 1 from Gerald’s first marriage. Eva and April have nothing to fear of the unknown with Lynn Johnston at the helm.