this woman’s work

I mean, look at this site: Brilliant!

Unless you’ve been lurking on the edges of Chamber of Commerce meetings you don’t know what a typical insurance agent looks like. Me, I know not only from those Chamber meetings but also all those years I spent hanging out at my dad’s insurance conventions. I’m used to a big slab of cheese on top of my insurance sales pitch. I’m talking guys who call women “little lady” and are used to throwing their weight around.

I’m scared of most insurance guys. Did I say scared? I meant hostile towards.

So this guy? I met him at a meeting today and he introduced himself as “a not entirely for profit insurance agent.” And that, of course, got my attention. Plus Brett and I were just whining about insurance (again) because that’s what freelancers are prone to do so my ears perk up any old way when I hear the word. Plus he has a kick-ass business card, which he handed to me along with a sticker that says BUY LOCAL COLUMBUS like on the front of his web site. Hey, he had me at “not entirely for profit” but the sticker and stellar biz card put me over the top.

I don’t know if his insurance will work for us (I’ll let the insurance expert aka Brett figure that out) but his heady dose of “be who you are and the work will follow” was a soothing balm to my troubled soul. Because if an insurance guy can head off cheesy and make a living, there is hope for the rest of us.

(By the way, the only thing more cheesy than an insurance guy is a financial planning guy. Which, by the way, is what my dad does now only he works with clients whose financial hem I cannot touch so it’s a special brand of cheese now. A unpasteurized triple cream, if you will, served in Provence by alabaster virgins.)

I had two great client meetings today. The first was with the owner and staff of this fantastic clothing store in the Short North, Substance. The clothes are beautifully designed, well-made and from sustainable manufacturers (often times using organic goods). There are fantastic purses from Ethiopia and the softest t-shirts designed right there in the store. They even have a handful of desigs made from discarded shirts brought in by customers. And the prices? Comparable to the clothes I was writing up at Express this summer (only much more beautifully, comfortably and respectfully made).

They brought me in for a Q&A about some web 2.0 stuff and I hope I’ll get to work with them further but whatever else happens, count me in as a fan.

Next I headed North to the Short North Business Administration to help John launch their new blog. Chris brought me in on the project — they set up the blog and asked me to help him figure out how to use the software. He’s a funny, personable, friendly guy and I had a good time showing him how WordPress and Twitter work. (He’s shortnorth on twitter.)

Now I’m watching Brett clean the kitchen while we wait for Abby to call and tell us she’s heading over to Kristen’s with the kids.

Anyway, it’s been a busy day and tonight will be a busy (social) evening and tomorrow I have some client calls and work to do then maybe I can rest a tiny bit this weekend. Or something. But today was fun — I like hearing about other people’s lives and I like helping them figure out how to do something new and interesting.

Oh last night I sent a proposal for a project that I’m really really really hoping gets approved (it’s a work thing — not a writing thing) because it would be a blast to put it together and I’d like to see what people would make of it. If you think you can type with your fingers crossed, please consider crossing them!

I can’t even tell you; it was just that bad. Today is better. It started off by getting a new client, it continued with a great phone call from one of my mentors, it went on with a well-deserved apology from my stressed but that’s no excuse husband, and right now it’s glowing with the quiet contentment of my two kids. Even though my childcare canceled (Gram Pam has a rotten stomach bug — send well wishes her way!), my late checks still aren’t showing up and I have this Great Big Hairy assignment due soon, I’m feeling a little more stable than yesterday.

Life is not easy, darn it, even when I wish it were.

There are things that make it easier. Things like friends on twitter who catch a grouchy tweet and lob it back with an offer of help. And things like friends via email who just so happen to ask how you’re doing when you really want to let loose. And another is commenters such as Cinnamon who may not like Columbus but who make great bags and turned me onto a really terrific, much needed book (The Boss of You). I wish I had this book a year and a half ago when I was just getting started!

What I love about The Boss of You is that it doesn’t assume that you’re in it to get rich, to make infromercials or to one day speak in title case To Show the World That You Are Here to Seize Control. In other words, it’s a business book for punk rockers, former and current riot grrls, crunchy granola earthmamas, feminists in sensible shoes and other women like us.

One of the biggest challenges I’ve had (and am still having to be honest) is moving around in the work-a-day world trying to grok the people who wear business clothes and speak in a language that doesn’t always make sense to me. (Although I was recently in a research study for seventy-five bucks and I said to the researcher, “I think this campaign is likely to go viral” and then “this ad copy doesn’t seem as sticky to me” so I must be picking it up somewhere.) Like all the people in marketing? They’re totally really fit. Like serious runners — marathoners, triatheletes. They have shiny eyes and friendly intensity. In fact, they make me want to have a bowl of ice cream and take a nap. I’m undone by such unbridled enthusiasm and intimidated by neatly pressed wardrobes. I’m not saying that I’m a slob but I’ve been known (as blog readers are aware) to use a stapler to fix a drooping hem and I’m prone to put off getting haircuts — the expense! — because I’d rather save that money for a rainy day.

In other words, I haven’t felt this out of place since about middle school.

Happily the people I’m meeting are much nicer than my peers in middle school so it’s not about that — it’s about learning to operate in a world that doesn’t necessarily share my values. Not like my values are all fired-up awesome or anything but they’re mine and I’m fond of them. Figuring out how to be me yet still communicate with people who are not much like me has been hard. And I don’t always do it right. Sometimes I think that’ll be the ruin of me but then books like this crop up and make it easier.

Once I was crying to Chris about this and I wailed, “But I don’t want to be a business woman!” and she shot back, “That’s because you have some crazy idea about what that means!” pointing out that maybe my prejudices were at issue and holding me back. It’s true, too, because I keep thinking I have to be my dad to be successful and while my dad has many things to teach me, I have to keep reminding myself that I can do it my own way. (I think. Yikes.)

Brett goes back to work tomorrow and he will be missed. Things I will miss most:

• His morning pancakes
• The way he brings me a second cup of coffee while I’m sitting at my desk
• Being able to start the morning at my desk undisturbed
• Knowing that he’ll run the kids to the park and/or library and otherwise fill their lives with wholesome activity
• His annoying singing in the morning
• Having him open the window I can’t reach above my desk
• Chatting with him over lunch
• Talking myself through writer’s block will he patiently listens
• Watching him serve dinner with a flourish and more singing
• All the errands he somehow finds time to run

Well, now I’m a little sad.

This has been a difficult year full of growth and struggle. I’ve learned more than I really wanted to know about the inner-workings of my financial fears and we’ve worked through so much as a couple. I’m excited about this next stage because I think it can get us where we want to be faster (mainly, getting Brett home again with a more stable budget — unless he loves his job so much he wants to stay there, too) and I’m also nervous about keeping up this level of work with a more challenging schedule.

The flipside of the challenging schedule is that I’ll be forced to leave work with work instead of carrying it along with me. I think if I drop most of my pro bono efforts that it’ll go a long way to freeing up my time. I also am going to do a lot less in-person networking and more working the network I already have (because I need to think about marketing, which always seems counterintuitive when I’m really busy but eventually the slow times will come back). And having the one car is going to be annoying. (There’s a bus that we think runs near his job but how near and the length of the commute have not been confirmed. We do know that it’ll be a trade-off: Having a car or having Brett home in a timely manner. It’s not economical to drive him myself gas-wise.)

I got most of my business systems worked out so that I can work more effectively and it’s going to be easier now than it was before Brett came home. (I wasn’t juggling nearly as much work then but what I was juggling I was handling badly.) Besides, it’s only seven weeks of Brett being gone days and then it’ll be a lot easier. (I do my best work in the morning and tend to burn out by about 2pm, which is when Brett will be heading out when his schedule changes.)

So we will be back to a 2-income family. I made a full-time salary in my ePreg days but since then my paychecks have been very much of the part-time variety so this will be the first time in quite awhile that our coffer will have the benefit of two folks throwing money at it. We’re thinking six to eight months and then we’ll reassess barring any exciting developments on my end.

I will also have less time to write for myself for the next two months, which makes me sad/frustrated. Thing is, it’s about long-term plans and knowing that it’s a priority for our future does much to ease my grousing.

Sometime I want to write more about how it’s been to change out our traditional gender roles (husband working, wife carrying for kids & home) and how it has and has not impacted our marriage. I will say that it’s been a bigger deal for people around us than for us although it did force us to confront some of our ingrained ideas about how our family works.

And in many ways it’s the perfect job because once he’s through the 7-week training he’ll go to second shift (3:30 to midnight), which means he will remain the primary caregiver when I’m working. We can have a big lunch as a family (instead of dinner) and on the days when I’m up to my neck with work, he leaves just as PBS Kids starts their afternoon programming, which means I can use the TV as my childcare during that time as women have done throughout the ages. Or at least throughout my particular age.

The two challenges are the 7-week training because it’s 9 to 5 and not worth it to go through the fight to find a decent sitter (I will cobble together childcare from family and friends so I’m not that worried — plus Noah is a good last-minute sister-wrangler) and it’s too far for him to walk/bike but not on a bus line. We may get a junker car for awhile. That’s what we did before — he had a lousy 2-door monstrosity that got great gas mileage and was just for his commute. For now likely he’ll take the van and I’ll rely on those friends and family for when I need a ride. Again this is why we moved here — there’s enough walkability that I don’t need a car most days anyway so it’s not a huge insurmountable block. I can always drive him, too, and we can take the bus to some of our homeschool stuff, which the kids will think is a treat and will remind me of Portland since that was our sole transport back then.

While I will no longer be the sole wage earner, I’ll still need to add my income to make our budget because the pay off for the flexible hours is not such great pay but we expected that. Our main goal is not to let go of our business because that has the most potential to give us the lifestyle that we want. And I have to admit that it’s nice to know that some of the heat is off of me so I won’t need to feel guilty when I’m writing something that won’t pay the bills.