I admit that I have always possessed a certain wariness about Craigslist. I also admit that this skepticism is pretty much based on nothing more than the fact that you can pick up a used bouncy house, a new career, and an experienced escort, all using the same home page. Hi, recipe for a shady + sketchy explosion of interests.
Honestly, though, I've really never used it much. And by much I mean, once, in an attempt to sell a basically brand new electric guitar, because high school Helen can give it up by now. (It's still on the market by the way, should anyone be interested.)
The other day, I decided to open my mind just enough to peruse the job offerings in the New Jersey and Philadelphia areas. I found myself to be slightly ... surprised. There were a decent amount of legitimate SOUNDING possibilities, several of which I decided, what the hell, I can email Jerry to get more information on this position. (Maybe, first question: is this real or fake? ... No, really, though. Which is it?)
Of the three that I pursued further, I heard back from two, both of which had eerily similar responses: No, we won't pay you, yes we might use your work, if we don't, oh well, here is our website, we care about the earth.
Wait, I lied. One of them did offer to pay me. In trees.
Really. That's what they said. GreenAnswers.com (a real website, by the way, and I guess I can admit, from first glance, a pretty cool one, at that?) said that for every published answer their telecommuting interns produce, they will plant one tree in Central America.
Just in case you don't believe me, here is an exact excerpt from the email I received from Carl, who sends his kind regards. (Really, that's what he said. I'm merely the messenger):
"Compensation for the GreenAnswers internship is quite different from other jobs. Normally, for the general public, for every 5 questions answered on the site, GreenAnswers plants a tree in Central America. However, for every single answer submitted by an intern, GreenAnswers will plant a tree. This means that over the course of your internship, you could be responsible for hundreds of trees to be planted in Central America. To plant the trees, GreenAnswers has partnered with Trees, Water & People (TWP), a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization.."
I don't want to be a jerk. And Carl sounds nice and grandly sincere, which is something I can always appreciate in another human being whether I'm receiving a mass-generated email or not. But I'm having a difficult time taking this seriously. And maybe you're wondering, like I was, well, what about after the duration of the internship? Do they hire you? Do they then pay you in actual checks? Maybe ornamental shrubbery, or potted plants? (They didn't really give a straight answer in this regard. The response was more or less a "Maybe" with a general nod in the direction that this is not likely, but go for it anyway.)
In truth, I do care about our planet. I try to do my part. I try not to do anything too obviously stupid or destructive, I try to take care, to leave things as I found them, if not better. I try to appreciate that we don't own the earth so much as we are granted permission for its use, and therefore given the responsibility to protect it and tend to it. In the grand scheme of things, it's our biggest job. Otherwise, we start to lose other things that we tend to think of as important, things crucial to survival, clean air, drinkable water, things to eat, places to live. These things matter. I get that.
But a new tree in Guatemala isn't exactly the type of compensation I need for hard work. It's a heartfelt one, it's a selfless one. But it isn't one that I can live on, even partially. If it was a money tree, or maybe even just a fruit tree, you would find me with a more open mind on the matter. Until then, however.
It's alright, though. Basically the moral here is that I can stop writing Craigslist off as a total hack. Maybe it's not my most trusted resource, unless I'm looking to buy a canoe or find a new Asian reflexologist. (That one I'm not making up. Really. It's there.) But I'll scan the job listings now and then. I don't really want to get paid in ears of corn or seashells.
They could sell me on kittens, though. I could definitely get paid in kittens.
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