Little to no work today
May 20, 2008 work work work
I theoretically have a day off from work because Brett is at Home Depot and I’m here with the kids. I’ve got Noah playing with Madison so I can at least get a little bit done this morning but I’m going to try very very hard not to work anymore today. I spent a very long time cramming work in around the kids so it feels normal to me to be fretting at the computer while the children nip at my heels but just because it feels normal doesn’t mean it feels good.
I can’t write/work unless I’m removed from the moment and in my own zone. I know not everyone works this way but I do and that’s why writing around the kids for the years before Brett’s lay off were excruciating; I always felt like my brain was being torn in two. Really. It hurts to have my train of thought derailed and so in the early Madison years, I was mostly frustrated and unhappy about work. This is why I don’t want to go back to Brett being gone full-time. I think I can deal with having occasional days like today but only if I steer clear of my computer until this evening when Brett gets back.
It’s funny how pressing deadlines feel so much more pressing when I’m not at my desk. I can sit here tooling around blogs not worried a bit about an essay I need to get written but send me upstairs away from my laptop and I get antsy and nervous about getting it done. It’s the attention divided that kills me.
Ooh, I’m already frustrated and I haven’t even run out of work time yet!!!!
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Tags: Brett, frustration, home depot, Madison, Noah, working, working from home, Writing
Being a bystander
May 19, 2008 Friends
When I was about thirteen the little girl who lived across the street told my mother that her parents were abusing her. She was about eleven and had grown up in foster care so it is true that at some point in her life she’d experienced horrific abuse and neglect. What was not true was that she was experiencing it when she asked my mom for help. My mother knew that her story – that she was only allowed to eat the food scraped into the garbage disposal – was probably not true but my mother called child protective services anyway. First she invited the neighbor girl to spend the night and then she called CPS. When the report turned out to be unwarranted, she apologized to the family but said she hoped they understood why she called. She wasn’t taking any chances, my mom explained, because no one called when she was a child and so the abuse continued.
Our chances of being saved from dire straits through the intervention of another person go down as more people become involved. That’s the lesson of Kitty Genovese. Instead of making a call to CPS, most of us would ask a friend first. “What should I do?”
My mom was brave to take in the neighbor girl and make the call. She also didn’t have any friends in the neighborhood to consult with first — no one to give advice or make her doubt herself. It’s ironic that if my mother had had more support that she might not have acted. The act (reaching out to protect a child) is morally separate from the results (an embarrassed and loving family forced to defend themselves to the state). But if she’d had more friends to talk to, they might have focused on the imagined results and talked my mom out of acting. I don’t know. I can’t ever know.
It’s less clear if there is no one saying, “Help me.” It’s hard to know what to do when you can see that there is something not quite right but there is a lot of noise in the way distorting the situation. I keep talking to people who know about as much as I do and who are just as conflicted and we all keep talking ourselves in and out of action. We keep looking for an opening because we don’t want to press. We keep, reluctantly, hoping for a crisis so that we know, yes, the situation demands our intervention.
Mostly we talk because talking almost feels like action. Analyzing every little thing seems a little bit like figuring out what to do next. Only it’s not and instead it feels like we are more mired than ever in doing nothing.
I’m frustrated. And sad. And angry at myself.
Maybe I’m too hung up on results. I want the outcome to be a certain way (where help is accepted, where the truth comes out, where change is made) and I know from past experience with this situation that I’m likely going to be as frustrated after as I am now. I also know that the situation is murky and that it could be argued that our concerned take on things is more about our values than about any moral truth. We all know we intervene if a child is eating out of the garbage disposal. What if there is no child and no garbage disposal?
Argh.
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Tags: child abuse, friendships, frustrated, my mom
Gimme five
May 18, 2008 Blogging
Swiped from Susan!
What were you doing five years ago?
Blogs are convenient. Apparently I was buying a fax machine, feeling thankful about not being pregnant and writing one of my favorite blog posts.
What are five things on your to-do list for today (not in any particular order)?
It’s 5:46pm so I’ll list what I’m doing tomorrow:
1. Blog for a client, (which I do every Monday).
2. Get at least one book review done.
3. Follow up on one query and draft a second.
4. Write an essay due Wednesday.
5. Make a menu plan, a grocery list and then actually get out and shop.
What are five snacks you enjoy?
1. Popcorn.
2. Fruit — most kinds.
3. Goat cheese.
4. Almonds.
5. Buttered toast.
What five things would you do if you were a billionaire?
1. Donate.
2. Invest.
3. Spend.
4. Retire.
5. Write a whole lot more.
What are five of your bad habits?
1. Snacking while I watch tv.
2. Whining.
3. Leaving my empty water glass next to the computer every single night.
4. Gossiping.
5. Filling out memes instead of, say, productively outlining an essay.
What are five places where you have lived?
1. California (where I was born and where Erica was born)
2. Boston (where Justin was born)
3. Chicago
4. Ohio
5. Portland, OR (where Noah was born)
What are five jobs you’ve had?
1. writer
2. at-home mother
3. shelter worker
4. preschool teacher
5. deli worker extraordinaire
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Tags: Erica, essay, Infertility, Justin, meme, memes, Noah, Portland, preschool, Shelter
Everything old is new again
May 17, 2008 Uncategorized
I’m home with the kids today while my husband is at work just like how things used to be but totally different. Brett started today at a Home Depot for three reasons:
- Possibility of getting help with our insurance;
- Learning to do some of the things around the house that need to get done and learning with an employee discount;
- A break from the kids.
Seriously — a break from the kids was a big reason he wanted a job. I hear that.
Meanwhile it looks like my on-site gig, (which amounts to about five days a month across two weeks), might be regular which is what I hoped. At least they’ve already assigned my time to come next month. Perfect! It’s a big chunk of our budget right there and a big relief. Plus it’s fun. I mean really, really fun.
We think we’ll be able to swing the scheduling so that one of us is with the kids while the other is at work but there will surely be times where I’ll have a client meeting when Brett is gone so we’ve got a few back up plans. My sister is always good for some childcare and I volunteered Abby (without speaking to her first but she was game) and there’s Noah’s friend L’s family and the inlaws are back in town, at least for now. So that’s all good although Madison has been periodically showing up in tears to remind us that she never, ever, ever likes to have playdates when one of us is not with her. She says that when she is a mommy she will never, ever, ever leave her kids.
“I hate [job site]! Do all mommies have to go to [job site]? Or do some not go?”
I told her not all mommies go there and she declared that she certainly will not then. I told her this is fine.
I was having some stress earlier this week because someone sent a marketing this or that my way and it was all about getting out there and making zillions of dollars and I looked at it and thought, “I can see a way to market myself with these tools” and I could see how it might work but I could also see that to do it I would have to kinda push and shove some other people who are dabbling in the same sort of thing. And also there’s this marketing tone that’s very, “How much money have YOU made today???” that doesn’t resonate with me AT ALL. In fact, it’s something that kept me leery of marketing communications as a career and I still duck and cover when I show up at a networking meeting and there’s someone at the door glad-handing everyone and saying, “I made six figures in the last six months! How badly do YOU want success???”
The truth is I want some success. This past April with the two missing checks? That’s made me feel a lot less down on the whole money-money-money credo. But — not to be corny — I would be happy with money-money; I don’t need money-money-money. (See, first money covers the bills and the second money puts cash in savings.)
When things were feeling very bad last month, Brett and I sat ourselves down and said, “Can we really do this?” Because it looked like we were on our way to failing. Should Brett go back to a full-time desk job? Would I have to go back to scrambling for nickel-and-dime jobs while the house descended into chaos behind me? We put it all out on the table and decided, “No. We’ll make this work.” (Part of this was because we knew there’d be some very “I told you so” types if we threw in the towel, which made us want to kick freelance ass because we are contrary like that.)
Way back at the beginning of this thing Julia asked me what I wanted from this. Last week she reminded me of this after listening to me angst about not wanting to take over the world. She said, “Dawn, do you remember what your goal was? It was to make enough money to support your habit of being with your family.” (Is that a great line or what?)
This past April scared me so I was thinking, has it scared me enough to head into the dog-eat-dog, high-enthusiasm, take-no-prisoners world of hard-core marketing communications marketing? To elbow my way to the front? To make enemies in the name of getting more work and higher pay-outs? And Julia said, no. Because I don’t need money-money-money when money-money will do.
She also reminded me that I’ve come a long way, baby, in the past year. I know a lot more now and I know which marketing groups seem worth it and which didn’t do much for me so I’m wasting a lot less time smiling stiffly at events. I’ve made friends and contacts and colleagues. I’ve added a whole lot of work to my portfolio. I’ve learned the lingo and how to use it. I’ve learned to listen more than I talk. I’ve got a work wardrobe for the first time in my life and I’ve gained so much confidence that everything feels a lot less hard.
Other accomplishments:
- I’ve had several public speaking gigs and have three more upcoming;
- I’m no longer nervous about returning phone calls to perfect strangers;
- I’m not afraid to turn down work that doesn’t suit me;
- I have people who come to me with work.
That last one, that feels great, lemme tell you.
If this on-site gig sticks around awhile we’ll be in the clear even if someone loses a check (or two) for four (or six) weeks. If Brett likes Home Depot (and I think he will), he’ll be able to get some of the work done around here that’s making him crazy. (Like refinishing our oak floors that weren’t sealed and so are getting trashed; like finishing the basement; like building out an office space for me; like replacing more tile in the crazy bathrooms; like fixing the solar panel thingies on the roof; like rescuing the house from its 50+ year old landscaping.)
And we can support our habit of spending time with each other and with our kids. I know — how selfish are we? But yesterday I worked all morning and then Brett watched three sets of kids for the afternoon while I went thrifting with the moms and then the families all went out to dinner together and Noah sat laughing with the big kids and Madison giggled and fell off her chair with the little kids while the dads talked budgets and the moms talked kids and I thought, “This is what I’m in this for. Friends and family and time enough to work.”
Like everything it’s a balance. I’ll work a zillion hours a week as long as I can do it on my terms — with breaks to eat a sandwich with my husband or watch Noah play lacrosse or give Madison a foggy bath for her runny nose. I’ll hustle and hustle and hustle if I don’t have to sell-out to do it. But I have to stop sometimes to reassess — am I where I want to be and on my way to the next right stop? Today I am. Next week I’ll check again. And on and on and on.
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Tags: at-home parenting, budget, budgets, Erica, freelance, freelancing, inlaws, Julia, Madison, marketing, marketing communications, networking, Noah, Parenting, values, working from home
Oh ye not on livejournal
May 15, 2008 Adoption
Magicpointeshoe is rocking some adoption terminology posts right now. Check ‘em out!!!