Movement junkies

I’m a card-carrying member of the RSSC (Radio Station Switching Club). It’s a disease. Like finger tourettes. Or something.

It’s car-specific. I’m either driving or riding in the passenger seat and I Constantly, Continually and Compulsively switch from radio station to radio station. These being the 3C’s of the RSSC.

If I happen upon a song I like, I stick with it for a little bit. But after about 30 seconds, I get that feeling again and I have to swing through the other stations–even if just lightening-quick, before I land back where I was.

Sometimes, to my detriment, I leave a perfectly good song to swing through many, many perfectly bad songs. And by the time I get back to the perfectly good song, it’s over and I’ve missed it. But, at least I tried. At least I made sure there was nothing better. See how this works?

The feeling can only be described as the Darwinian itch to, wait for it, see if there’s something else out there that would behoove me more.

Wait.

Did I say that it was car-specific? Of course it isn’t. Nor does it have anything to do with music.

I’m a movement junkie.

I sat on a bus to NYC a month or so ago next to a lovely lady who unabashedly watched me work for awhile. She stared, goggle-eyed. And then, finally, remarked on my multi-tasking abilities, and my speed.

“I have to go this fast,” I told her. “Otherwise, I’ll fall asleep. Or run off to the circus.”

So…it’s a good thing for a freelancer juggling a zillion writing and web projects along with the chaos of social media. But, there’s another place where it gets a little sticky.

By definition, being a movement junkie means that you have a hard time sitting still, just being…with what is. Metaphysically, emotionally, cognitively. I’m practically the anti-Buddha.

• Head hurts? Drop something on your foot!
• Feeling empty? Call an old boyfriend and open up a can of worms, crap, whoopass.
• Tired? Make a list of all the things you have to do.
• Totally content and at peace? No problem, we’ll find something that itches or needs to be dealt with.

Wherever you might be, whatever you might be feeling? No worries. The movement junkie will find a way to something else.

Some people might see this as a negative. There’s agitation, there’s dissatisfaction, there’s an endless search. Some days, even I see it as a negative. I just want to be. For once, I don’t want to feel compelled to do.

Truth be told, it’s a very uncomfortable feeling to not be able to just sit and observe your state without doing everything you can to scramble out of it—primarily because it feels so damn uncomfortable to just sit in the feeling in the first place. Which is, duh, why we do everything we can to hop out. Immediately, if not sooner.

It doesn’t matter if the hopping out lands you somewhere worse. Victory is yours because you aren’t where you were. Again, see how this works?

But. (and that’s a big, bold but) There’s also, artistry, determination, energy, thrill. Change, growth, development, adventure, newness, opportunity. Granted, some of those words are rather vanilla and certainly overplayed. Yet, they’re what live in this compulsion. They’re what push the movement junkie on.

They’re what we find, quite frequently, when we jump to a different station.

Transferable

I hope you can really see this picture. It’s the work of my little man, Jack (aka, the Snack Pack). This is his signature image. You’ve got the backhoe and the guy with his helmet inside. Jack doesn’t go anywhere without his guys and their helmets.

Typically, Jack works with paper and pen. Sometimes crayon, the occasional pencil. Watercolors and a brush also serve him well. But this was his first foray into sand.

Note: The first group is relatively similar—they offer a smooth, plain surface on which you draw with a handheld tool. But, the sand and no tool—this is a new world.

With just his finger, he created an exact replica of his picture. He’s gotten so good at this image, that he can produce it, apparently, wherever and whenever. He navigated shells and seaweed, the downward slope of the beach to the water, passersby, seagulls, differing degrees of sand wetness and firmness, not to mention encroaching waves with great aplomb.

He stood back and surveyed his magic like a seasoned artist. His bright, blue eyes narrowed. His white blond hair crazed on head.

__________________________

I was talking to a friend and colleague last night, as she prepares for an interview for a new gig. And we were talking about resumes. They seem so passé at this point, but they’re still necessary as they document where you’ve been and what you’ve done. Even though, likely and hopefully, the details/juice/meat of that work will get pulled out during the interview.

My suggestion was to lead with what she can do and how she does it, let the ‘where’s and ‘with whom’s fall to the bottom of the list. Because, while they prove you’re legit, they’re just labels,  just platforms. Like paper, pen, brush, paint, canvas.

What we really want to know is, can you take your skills, your know-how, your perspective, your signature—and make the leap onto the sand?

What’s right with Jenni.

I waitressed for several years. Through college, through grad school. And I enjoyed it thoroughly. I loved how the time went by so fast, no watch-looking necessary. I loved how it was always new. I loved the free food. I loved the little family the staff created. I loved that I never, ever had to take this uncomplicated work home with me. I chatting away with all of my customers. I loved the flirt of it. (I was voted biggest flirt in high school, you know.)

À la Bull Durham: You seat the people, you feed the people, you get paid by the people. Sometimes they’re easy, sometimes they’re assholes, sometimes they sexually harass you. It’s really just like baseball.

Wearing the hideous uniform of the three restaurants I slung food at, I showed up all bright and shiny and new on my first day—wishing and praying for it to be my 30th.

The road to weakness

You see, I don’t like not knowing. It’s extraordinarily uncomfortable for me. The minute I’m somewhere new, I long for familiarity. I want to know where the coffee lives, how the chef likes you to place special orders, what time you can finally eat or sit down, how to use the archaic cash register.

In my mind, sadly, the ‘not knowing’ equals stupidity which then brings me quickly to weakness. And I don’t like weakness. (Mind you, I don’t feel this way about You not knowing something—this is personal cruelty only.)

But, what can you do? There is literally no way around the not knowing. So…I would:

• Watch, listen and learn with a vengeance.
• Hide my self-dismay.
• Crack jokes about how the door into the kitchen bashed me on the ass at least 12 times.
• Find the things I knew how to do and do those.
• Ask questions to get essential info.
• Just get through it, nose down and eyes high—knowing it won’t last forever. Nothing does.

This week

I just started a new project (as in a whole new, insanely exciting medium). And it hit me, square in that vulgar place in my brain that hates starting something new, that I somehow put myself into a career where I have new moments constantly. CONSTANTLY! CONSTANTLY!

New clients, new projects, new deadlines, new terminologies, new industries, new technologies, new writing styles. New, new, new, new, new, new, new. (BTW, that was said as only Anthony can say things, for all of you SATC (TV, not movie) fans.)

Fascinating. Like someone terrified of blood deciding to go to med school. (And then being shocked to find that there’s talk or sight of blood most days.)

So…what, exactly, is wrong with me? Does it seem odd? Or does it make total sense.

There’s this quote in my new favorite book ever, Born to Run. Background: McDougall is talking about a woman who discovered that literally all she wanted to do was run (naked, mind you, in just her shoes, through the backcountry of Idaho the summer she came to volunteer, mid-college and mid-eating disorder). Here’s the quote:

…Jenni has been hard-core ever since, running long miles even when Idaho is blanketed by snow. Maybe she’s self-medicating against deep-seated problems, but maybe (to paraphrase Bill Clinton) there was never anything wrong with Jenni that couldn’t be fixed by what’s right with Jenni…

I pile on more work than one human should be able to do because I actually can do it. I abhor weakness because I have a deep well of strength. I put myself into discomfort because I’m very good at finding my way out.

Huh. Yeah. Maybe we are all our own antidotes.

Image credit: Steve Snodgrass

I’m not sorry. Are you?

Call me a linguistics geek, but I prefer to ‘apologize’. And there is a difference.

Sure. You did something less than nice. Or maybe you just bumped into someone by accident. Maybe you made an error.

But, are you really sorry? I do realize there are two separate definitions for this word, but I can’t say the word without thinking of definition #2, which reads:

in a poor or pitiful state or condition

I can regrettably make mistakes, but I’m neither poor nor pitiful.

Which is why I simply apologize.

*********************

Recently, Naomi Dunford wrote a post about an interaction with a client gone awfully wrong. It’s an intense post on several levels, and in it she says,

“We sometimes have this belief that we have to tolerate anything a client puts out. No. You don’t. Be understanding if you want to be understanding and forgive if you want to forgive. But don’t squash down that part of yourself that says, “HELL NO I’m not going to get treated like that” because you’re afraid of losing clients.”

There was talk about the mislaid belief that if you’re being paid by the person, you have to take it. Um…they’re not paying you to feel bad. They’re paying you to do a job. See the difference? I don’t know about you, but there is no ‘pile on the abuse’ clause in my contracts.

Is this also about semantics? I wonder. Ish.

Like I said, apologize, but don’t be sorry. Don’t grovel. Find a solution, make it better and move forward. You do not suck, you made a mistake (unless you really suck, but hopefully you don’t and I’m giving you the benefit of the doubt).

Isn’t this the same conversation we have about getting paid what you’re worth? Isn’t this the same conversation we have when we feel blocked?

You’re the only one who can name your value and then stand behind it—and deserve it. You’re the only one that can get it done. Two things that are terribly hard to do when you’re feeling sorry.

And now I’m kicking your virtual ass out of this virtual plane. But I highly recommend you use a real parachute.

Image credit: jcarwash31

Bull balls, How I’m not like a cow & The boss and the bitch

FYI, I could not decide on a title, so, yes, you got all three.

Bull Balls

This is what I love about my job, it opens my door to the coolest people and their fascinating subjects. Case in point, I recently spent the afternoon with a new client talking about castrating bovine. And laughing – it’s a woman thing that we take odd pleasure in such things. And it’s really pain free, she says, they just tie a rubber band around the testes and they get numb (you know, like if you do that to your finger) and then they turn black and fall off.

Easy peasy!

You see, unless women are looking to procreate, we don’t care that much about balls which is why we laugh about castration. As Miranda puts it so eloquently on SATC, “I’ve never once called my girlfriends after a date and said, ‘He had such big balls! Strong arms? Sure. Nice abs? Maybe. But never the balls! Frankly I wouldn’t know if you had 1 or 10 down there.”

But enough about balls – or bulls for that matter because during this meeting, I also learned some fascinating things about cows (and myself).

How I’m not like a cow

Apparently #1: Cows are creatures of habit. So, when you do something different they freak out. It could be as huge as milking them for the first time or as small as changing the time they get milked. They like to know when things are going to happen, how this shiz is going to go down.

When I heard that, I instantly thought, Me too! And then I rethought my thought and thought, Actually? Not so much. Thing is, I ‘used to be’ like that. I used to be a control freak (a few of you are snickering and I can hear you), but it’s changing. Okay, okay, about a few things I still like my control, like I literally won’t eat margarine or food with ingredients I can’t pronounce (unless it’s because they’re written in French or Italian or Japanese).

By definition, the freelancer’s life is a swirl of unpredictable activity. Our economic status can soar or plummet without a moment’s notice. A deadline can hit us from out of nowhere. Sometimes we have to fill our days on our own because clients can’t be seen for miles. Now, I can get a little hyper when a lot of balls (pun intended) come flying at me at once, but that’s not freaking out – that’s fanning the flames, amping up my energy to meet the task and then, whirling through all the madness pretty happily – and entirely un-cowlike.

The boss and the bitch

Apparently #2: In every herd of cows, there’s the cow that thinks she’s in charge and there’s the cow that is in charge. The cow that thinks she’s in charge at the Grey Barn in Chilmark, is Thelma. She tries to boss everyone around, she wants to be dominant, she attempts to lead the other cows to and fro. And she’s kind of bitchy about the whole thing – loud, pushy, obnoxious.

The cow that is in charge is Helen. And she’s more the silent type.

So, how’s this all working out? Well the story I heard was that Thelma gets so busy playing boss that she doesn’t notice at first, say, that Helen has actually led the other cows across the field. When Thelma finally realizes it, she hauls ass over the pasture to catch up. Which leads me to believe that Thelma knows she isn’t really the boss, she just tells everyone that she plays one on TV.

The actual lead cow, Helen, doesn’t try to put this nuisance in her place. Helen’s smart, savvy, patient. She knows she’s in charge, it’s undeniable. Unless Thelma puts either herself or the herd in harm’s way, Helen just kindly ignores that bitch and goes about her business.  I imagine Helen smiling her cow smile, keeping Thelma safe and steadily, confidently leading the way.

Note which cow wears the pants in this family. Food for thought, I tell ya. (unless you’re a vegetarian).

Image credit: JelleS

The more

One of my clearest childhood memories is walking home from school one day when I was in the fourth grade. We were lucky to live one house away from the school grounds, so my walk consisted of about a half block – past the playground and its huge black-top, then past the little preschool building, then past our neighbor’s house with the huge lions guarding their front door that I loved to ride. And then I was home.

But on this day I remember so well, the walk took forever. It was torrentially pouring and lightening and thundering (my mom reads this blog, so feel free to berate her for not helping me get home safely). It also happened to be Passover. And I was convinced that this rain storm I could hardly see through was one of the plagues.

I knew then how tough it was to be a chosen people.

Twenty-six years and Seders later, I sat down last night with my family and friends on another rainy night to celebrate rebirth and spring (did you know that while Rosh Hashanah is the celebration of the new year, Passover is actually the anniversary of creation? I just found that out and it makes perfect sense, though I’ve still got my money on evolution) and to remember the hardships of slavery my ancestors endured in Egypt.

The leader of our Seder asked the children (ages 3 – 16) if they thought slavery was a thing of the past or if they thought it still existed. Of course they thought it was ancient history and made cracks about being enslaved by their parents, they live privileged lives on a picture perfect island. The adults all acknowledged that slavery still existed, but we were stunned by what she told us next.

According to the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center (and many other sources I confirmed with online):

Slavery still exists today. Whether it is called human trafficking, bonded labor, forced labor, or sex trafficking, it is present worldwide, including within the United States and, increasingly, in your local community.

An estimated 12 – 27 million people are caught in one or another form of slavery. Between 600,000 and 800,000 are trafficked internationally, with as many as 17,500 people trafficked into the United States. Nearly three out of every four victims are women. Half of modern-day slaves are children.

Passover has always been my favorite holiday – and not just for the wine and the macaroons and the leg of lamb. It’s a holiday based on telling stories and asking questions; in effect, reviewing the past and wondering in the present how we can make the future better. And every year, every single year, I learn something new and walk away more aware, more ready…

Everything is relative, you know. Even slavery. Many of us here are slaves to our work, to our creative minds, to our relationships, to our writing, to our paychecks, to our government, to our HMOs. But is a young girl held against her will and made to do vile things and not fed more than a crust of bread worse off than me as I chain myself to contracts and my distracted mind that just can’t focus some days. Hell yes.

And maybe that realization can help me free myself…to do more, be more, give more, produce more, act more, live more. Just more.

Image credit: goto10

Back-up plans, face plants and rice

I was going to post something different this morning, but then I almost died, so I changed my tack. Granted, my take on this morning’s events might be a slight exaggeration, but we’ll never know, now will we?

Here’s what happened. I work in a small studio space, one room, adorable, cozy, happy. And this morning I was making rice. I let it boil and then I turned the heat on the stove way down to simmer and walked away to work.

About 45 minutes later, I got up to get some water and realized that the flame on the stove was out, which made me realize that it smelled an awful lot like gas in my studio. And that I was dizzy (though that may have been psychosomatic – read, I have a very vivid, suggestable and active imagination).

So I opened up all of the windows, letting the rain and wind sweep through, literally clearing the air. The actress in me even stuck my head out the window and took in a nice deep breath.

After this close call, I’m thinking I need one of those buttons on my desk. A help button, an emergency button, an ‘I’ve fallen and I can’t get up button’. I mean, would I have had time to Skype Shauna or Ron or Leslie (who are always just an IM away) before my face hit my keyboard? Maybe if we had a codeword. Though my nose probably wouldn’t have the wherewithal to remember it, let alone enter it correctly as it falls forward.

As many of us here are freelancers – copywriting, designing, social media’ing – and work alone, I’m wondering: what’s the back-up plan? As in, who’s got your actual back? Is anyone aware of your whereabouts and health status? Is someone checking in to make sure you’re alive during the day?

How long would it have taken for someone to find me? I’m due at a Seder tonight at 5:30, so there’s that. But on a regular Monday? Oy, I shiver at the thought.

Personally, and for what it’s worth, if 5:00 came and went and I never bugged Shauna about one of the zillion client projects we’re working on or didn’t run something by Ron or didn’t just generally connect with Leslie or if one of them pinged me and I didn’t answer – they would know something was wrong. But by then it would be too late and I’d already be dead.

I’m very, uberly, wickedly superstitious. So now I’m worried that I’m writing my fate. If I do die mysteriously at my desk in the next few days, don’t get too creeped out, just know that I have mad intuitive skills – and see it as a nice little kick in the ass from me to: 1. Get some sort of back-up plan, and 2. Check your stove regularly when cooking rice.

Image credit: kharied

Pretty Girl Karma

Surprisingly, this post applies to my male readers too – and to people that don’t consider themselves to be pretty (you really are, like it or not).

Writers, freelancers, work from homers – whoever you may be. At some point in your illustrious career, some lovely person has said this to you, “That’s so cool that you work from home! You can just wear your pajamas all day and no one will care or see you!”

Uh huh. It’s true. We could do that. And some days, I’m sure we all do.

I’m going to go out on a limb here and proclaim, superficiality be damned, that what we wear, how we costume ourselves, really does matter. It affects what we think about ourselves, how we act, how we talk, what we say, what actions we take.

When I dress in sweats and running shoes, I’m casual, I slump – sometimes when I look from the work I’m doing on my computer down to my clothes and back up again, it occurs to me that I’m maybe I’m only ‘playing’ writer.

So, I don’t do that anymore. Because when I wear jeans that fit in all the right places, my good bra that erases 3. 5 years of pregnancy and nursing with a single clasp, a beautiful and stain-free sweater and shoes that make me almost as tall as most other people who are on the shorter side of average height – then, I feel it when I’m sitting in this chair.

I’m confident, I’m worthy, I’m an adult, I’m a professional. I’m in touch with my power source. I own it. You can see it in the way I hold myself, in the way I walk, in the way I am and in the way I do. I dare say it’s my pretty girl karma. Because what I put out, comes right back at me – respect, value, compensation for what I’m worth, hotness, good people, great projects.

And in this case, karma is not a bitch. (Unless you piss her off.)

This post is dedicated to the FANTASTIC Kelly Diels who, when I told her that I dressed hot for the big Dragon Tattoo Blog Hunt launch yesterday even though no one saw me all day, remarked, ‘Of course…pretty girl karma’ without skipping a beat – and sparked my brain and ignited this post. Kelly gets it and just so you know, Kelly always looks hot and always shows plenty of Cleavage. I love her to bits.

What about you? Do you have power clothes? A power look? Are you affected by your threads? How?

Image credit: AlyssssylA

What’s security anyway?

I got a phone call yesterday afternoon. Well, first I got a message via LinkedIn requesting the call, then I got the call.

It was from a recruiter. Offering a very (very) high paid job at a company in Boston. For those of you who read this blog regularly and saw yesterday’s post, you can join me in a good laugh here: the position was to create and manage the social media department – wait for it – for a PR firm.

I know. As an old friend used to say, you just can’t make this stuff up.

It turned out that the job wasn’t right for me, the company’s looking for someone with strong social media experience and hands-on programming experience (HTML, Javascript, AJAX, XML, etc.) Which would be like asking me if I could write and do chemistry…which I couldn’t, can’t and, quite frankly, won’t. (If this is YOU, let me know and I’ll guide you right to this recruiter!!! And don’t let the Boston thing scare you, they’re even willing to pay for relo.)

Even though that particular job wasn’t for me, we got to talking – and said recruiter was very excited about what it is that I do, how I do it and why I do it. To be honest, I was excited about my answers too. And this confirmed that it would be sorta hard to woo me away from my present situation – owning my own company, being my own boss, freelancing and the randomness that comes with it.

Let’s be honest.

An actual job has some things going for it: a steady paycheck, health insurance, VACATION TIME, SICK TIME               sorry – I’m back, I think I just fainted for a minute there.

But, and it’s a big BUT – how secure would this job really be? As it stands, my success is entirely dependent on me. It’s a lot of pressure, but at least it’s mine. I do well when I work hard, seize opportunity, smear my gumption all over people…and things like that. I do poorly when I don’t do those things. And I have no one to blame but myself. Really. Even if I get screwed over or let down by a client, it’s up to me whether I cry about it and sling responsibility (and we all deserve at least 5 minutes of this) or whether I just get up and go find another one, a better one. Companies fold all the time or it’s just not a good fit or…there are so many things that could make this opportunity crumble.*

So, what I told her was, “Of course, I’ll send my resume, but:

• I’d be more interest in working as a contractor,
• Or as a consultant,
• Or on a special project for a few weeks to several months,
• And I’d need to telecommute,
• But I’d be happy to travel in on a regular basis.”

I’m not closing any doors. If a job-job came along that was just perfect (and had a sizable signing bonus), I would heavily consider it. As always, there is no definitive path…but there’s a helluva lot of excitement and possibility.

What about you? If you had your choice, would you go it alone or pull your chair up to a cubicle?

*I’m really not a pessimist. The other night, a loud truck with flashing lights woke me up in the middle of the night – my first and only thought was, why are they cleaning the streets at this hour? When, in fact and of course, it was a snowplow and we were in the middle of a snowstorm on March 1st. I think this is a sign of my deeply embedded optimism. (Which is why, for now, I’m putting my chips on Writing Roads.)

Image credit: Lokner

When old media and new media play together in the sandbox

‘This is a very simply game. You throw the ball, you catch the ball, you hit the ball. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. Sometimes…it rains.” Bull Durham

As I see it, one of my roles on this blog is, for lack of better words, to play the fool. For you that is. In other words, I’m taking one for the team. I’ve said time and time again that I’ve wished, both when I was starting out and still as I find my way, that I had someone like me who I could ask for advice or learn from. But I didn’t when I was starting and I frequently forget to ask for help now…so here I am as a result, sometimes doing it right, sometimes doing it wrong, sometimes…just doing it.

And last week, I did something wrong. So I’m here to tell you about it so that you, hopefully, don’t do it wrong if the opportunity should present itself.

Swimming around the freelancers’ pool

Freelancing has placed me in wide variety of situations at this point, I’m assuming you could say the same. By definition, we get thrown into all matter of circumstances where we may or may not have any clue how to act or be or do. Over our heads, soaked to our ankles, blowing bubbles, treading water or swimming speedily through the course – sometimes within a span of 5 minutes. Right?

Currently, I’m working on a massive project with a sizable team, we’ve got a little bit of every role you could imagine. Specific to my ‘doing it wrong’, we have two publicists. They’re Big deals. (It was suggested that I add the capital ‘B’).  One of them is French – and I imagine her sitting at a huge mahogany desk with a toy poodle on her lap and a long, thin cigarette hanging off of a long porcelain cigarette holder between her long thin fingers. Her hair is piled on top of her head and she’s wearing Chanel. But I have no idea if that is even a little bit true.

Anyway, I pissed her off.

You see, on a regular basis, the publicists send out emails to the team alerting us to news breaks or product mentions. And I, in my blind ignorance and bloggy haze of ‘we’re all in this together’, figured they were just letting us know whenever we were featured in the media. Since I’m running the social media campaign, I’ve engaged many listening tools – effectively holding my trusty stethoscope up to the internet – so that I know every time we ‘appear’ online. Obviously, then, I thought I should contribute to these emails as well. You know – one for all and all for…

Oops.

I got told off…and how (and quickly) for this gaff. Those press breaks they were sending were gigs the publicists themselves had landed. The break is there metric for their work for the client. Had I secured the mention I just emailed? (she asked). Um…nooooo, not so much. I just thought we were all spreading the good news. It turns out, we weren’t. Not even a little bit.

All worked out fine, I apologized, I never did it again, I returned to my corner to do my job. And I learned some things, which makes it all worth it in the end:

1. Now that I know why what I did wasn’t okay, it seems blaringly, glaringly obvious.
2. This is true of most lessons learned, except maybe those gleaned from a calculus textbook.
3. When entering a new situation, take a good look around and identify things that might not be familiar.
4. Find someone, either within the fray or without, that is familiar with those things.
5. If you feel like doing a certain something that is out of your general knowledge area, ask this someone for guidance: Run it by them first.
6. Keep your wits about you – did you just break a cardinal rule? ruin a business? step over a cultural line? threaten someone’s place on the totem pole? Put your mistake in perspective.
7. Life is very interesting when the old media and the new media play together in the sandbox.
8. My skin is getting thicker. Once upon a time I might have been mortified or at least obsessed about my faux pas. This time I said ‘whoops!’, laughed and moved right along.
9. What’s next? (Thank you, President Bartlett). The only way out of an error is forward. Fix it, change your behavior, don’t do it again.
10. When you have the best readers in the world, it isn’t that hard to tell them about the times when you’re stupid.
11. I really do love to share. It’s how I got myself into this mess…and it’s how I’m getting myself out.

Image credit: Banalities