Wide open

March 12th, 2010

Warning: this post is kinda gross.

My birth experience was horrid: preeclampsia, 2 lb. baby, NICU (neonatal intensive care unit). All bad. I also had an emergency c-section. Let me tell you, it is a crazy thing to be awake while you are cut open. Then, it is a terrifying thing to move about the world with your abdomen cut open.

Yes, there were stitches binding me together. But I wouldn’t move without pressing a folded towel tightly against the incision. Granted, I was in a trauma state from the whole experience, but my fear that all-of-my-everything would spill out of me was as real as the hormone induced tears that I couldn’t make stop.

Then, yesterday, I was having a conversation about the fact that you can feel 180 degrees different about the same ‘thing’ depending on the circumstance.

Because when I write – and when I’m on – I feel like my head, my heart and guts are sliced wide open. But it’s glorious. I pray the cut will deepen. I would do anything to keep it open. To plant stakes in the sides and let it all flow without constraint.

Somethings you’re desperate to keep inside. Others you urgently need to release.

Image credit: Martin Clifton

Filed under Writing | Tags: copywriting, creativity, parenting, Writing | Comments (2)

Cherry ChapStick, Resilience and Non-Hoopla

February 17th, 2010

I had another post planned for today, but I feel totally compelled to write about our surgery experience – and yes, it does have something to do with writing, because it has something to do with life – and life seeps into everything. And by everything, I mean everything.

So, for those of you that don’t know, my four year-old daughter had surgery yesterday. Not a heart transplant, mind you, they just removed her adenoids and put tubes in her ears. But, she did have general anesthesia and a lovely anti-nausea and narcotics cocktail.

Things you see in hospitals

She did great. First, she was thrilled to have her moms to herself this morning. But, then we got to the hospital. I saw an elderly (to be honest, half-dead looking) woman being gurney-ed by and I tried to distract Sophie, but to no avail. She maneuvered and watched and absorbed…and I think that was the moment when she started to cling to me with all she had.

And then, a scary looking nurse who looked like she hadn’t eaten anything but Mary Kay products since 1984 took us into the changing room and poured her cold demeanor all around us like lighter fluid on an arson’s target. Soph started to cry shriek and wouldn’t let us undress her. Not even the kitties on her teeny, tiny scrubs could get her to budge. Promises of popsicles and ice cream finally did.

More TV references

The worst part for me was seeing Sophie’s fear and hearing her cry. I had weird Ally McBeal type visions of throwing my baby to the wolves. How could I voluntarily put her in a scary and painful situation? Oh, yeah. Because she was already in a painful situation and this would help. So, I mommed up and put on just about the sexiest moon suit you’ve ever seen so that I could go into the OR with Sophie until she was soundly drugged sleeping.

Mystical ChapStick

And then, the nurse did something so magically enthralling – my head is still spinning. Pay close attention because I can’t figure out what her trick was…so maybe you can: She showed Soph the little mask that she’d wear while she was getting gassed (What?! That’s essentially what was going to happen!) and then, wait for it, she took out a tube of cherry flavored ChapStick. She smeared red goo all over the inside of the clear mask and handed it to Sophie who instantly put it over her nose and mouth and delighted in sniffing fake cherry, talking to all of us through the mask and trying to look down at it with cross eyes.

I carried her into the OR, mask still voluntarily glued to her face. We met the nurses and I put her on the bed. Mind you, she’s still holding the mask securely on. The anesthesiologist attached the hose and suddenly she’s acknowledging that it might not smell quite as good now. Sophie keeps the mask on. Then he tells her that it might make her laugh, this new smell in the mask. So I start singing, “I love to laugh’ from Mary Poppins (because my plan when they told me that they were going to start and my baby was freaking out was to sing to her – like I was sung to 4 years and 3 months ago – the last time Sophie and I were in an operating room together).

But they hadn’t given me any warning. I was joining this program already in progress.

There was one moment when, I imagine, the room began to swirl around her that Sophie’s eyes widened and she pushed herself towards me (mask still firmly affixed by her own hand) and called out ‘Ma J!’(that would be my name according to my children) in a fairly concerned and scared voice. And I kept singing and stroking her hair and smiling into her eyes, until they closed.

And she’s out

At which point I burst into tears and begged the nurses to take care of my baby. They said they would – one remarking that they didn’t want the responsibility of hurting her in anyway. I think this was a joke, but it was a strange one. Right?

Forty minutes later, while we refused to think about anything but the Olympics on TV in the waiting room, they called us back in. We could hear her crying from the hall. She was PISSED. And confused and totally disoriented. She wanted my water, she wanted the IV out, she wanted to go home, she wanted – and this is an educated guess – to feel normal and not so damn uncomfortable.

Finally, the nurse narcotized her via the IV in what I can only imagine is akin to what they do to belligerent mental patients. Soph fell sound asleep for 45 minutes and woke up covering her ears because for the first time in about two years, her ears were no longer filled with fluid and she could hear. At that point, she sat up and told us – quite lucidly – that she had been very crabby before, but then had taken a big nap and now felt all better.

That resilience I was talking about

We threw her in the car and took off. By the time we got to the ferry, she seemed completely normal. By the time we got off the ferry she had consumed a bag of carrots, a bunch of fruit and a peanut butter and jelly sandwich…and she wanted more. By the time we got home she was jumping up and down with her brother and hugging her dogs and bossing everyone around. She had two huge plates of veggie stirfry and rice for dinner.

The hospital bracelet around her ankle was literally the only sign of her morning’s activity.

So, that’s the story, but what’re the lessons? What did we learn?

1. Well, cherry ChapStick has magical powers. I think we can all agree to that.

2. My kid kicks ass. (Come on, like you weren’t thinking that too?)

3. Resilience is awesome to watch. And it comes easily when one is full of gumption and surrounded by love.

4. But, the most important lesson was this: Practice Non-Hoopla. In other words, Don’t make a big deal out of things. Can you imagine if, when we went into the OR, they had told her what they were going to do, and said things like, ‘you might feel dizzy’ or ‘here it comes!’ or ‘we’re going to start now!’ Instead it was all very matter of fact, no frills, no alarms, no danger signs. It just sort of happened – no muss and no fuss. It was brilliant.

I’m thinking hard about how to apply this lesson to life, to my business as a copywriter, to my writing – and I’m going to break it down tomorrow…so stay tuned…

(Oh, and thanks to those of you that sent kind words and messages…your support was so, so appreciated!)

Filed under How To, Myth or Reality, News | Tags: copywriting, kids, life, parenting, stress, Writing | Comments (18)

How to be effective

May 18th, 2009

About a year ago, I was fortunate enough to see Karol Rose of Flexpaths speak. This burgeoning company, and Karol along with it, is changing the way we think about work, workstyle flexibility and life in general….and I’m thrilled to be writing for them. After I saw Karol speak, I wrote about her theory of work/life balance – which basically states that the quest for ‘balance’ is a myth and a recipe for heartache and stress.

Karol maintains that we should reach for work/life effectiveness instead, and this weekend I was the poster child for her theory.

Take a two year-old boy + a three year-old girl + a Blackberry/Mac/Writing/Blogging/Twitter obsessed mom and subtract my wife (you know, the reigning Mother of the Year champ) and put them together for 53 hours with no outside help whatsoever.

The perfect storm?

It could have been, but I took Karol’s advice to heart. I needed to be effective at home this weekend. So, I turned off my computer, ignored my Blackberry’s charming gong that tells me I have yet another email and sunk deeply and contentedly into my role as Mom…And I had the time of my life.

Sure, some writing ideas popped into my head and I scribbled them down. Once or twice I checked Twitter to see what was happening. But my mindset was all about home. I can assure you that if I had had the goal of getting a few work things done this weekend, we all might have imploded.

In this case, ‘balance’ was found by tipping the scales profoundly and completely in the direction of home.

Apply this lesson where you will. If you’d like to be effective anywhere, anyhow, anytime – Just. Do. IT.

Image courtesy of Zen

Filed under Critical Copywriting, The Business | Tags: Facebook, Julie Roads, mom, parenting, social media, time management, Twitter, work flexibility, worklife balance, Writing, Writing Roads | Comments (9)

Twitter Community Rescues Parent

January 30th, 2009

Last night, I had a heck of a time getting one of my kids to bed. When I finally did around 10, I headed to my computer to tackle some deadlines. I was feeling upset about the sleep situation, so I asked my Twitter community the following question:

“Okay, who has the magic button for getting toddlers to go to sleep? I need it desperately.“

In short order, I had roughly 100 responses (@replies and DM’s – direct messages) – from moms, dads, parenting experts, sleep experts, healers, astrologists and generally caring and humorous people.

Anyone who plugged in and happened to be following me got a pretty big dose of my tweets – because I was madly engaged in this incredible conversation with my tweeps. This community of people that I simultaneously really know and really don’t know at all. Some people dug deep asking me questions for clarification, hence, furthering the conversation and @replies.

During this ‘event’ – one person stopped following me and one made an underhanded comment insinuating that it was too much. Which made me ponder the whole scenario.

My thoughts:

If I engaged in conversations – that involved a tremendous amount of tweets in a short time span – like last night on a regular basis, it would be annoying. I would expect people to stop following me. I’d stop following me.
I’m bowled over by the love and support that came flowing to me last night. Really, you guys are true gems – so helpful, so on my team. Who knew?
This is the purpose of Twitter. It’s not just about business, it’s about relationships and being real people. And, like it or not, in my real life yesterday at 10 pm EST I was on night 575 (give or take a few) with a 3 year old who refuses to sleep without me glued to her little self. I needed a little love from my community. Parenting is hard, if you haven’t heard, and heartily done as a group exercise.
When I asked the question, I expected a few ‘oh, that sucks!’ and ‘mine too!’ and ‘give her whiskey’ (all of which I did get, by the way) – but I never imagined that I’d get all that I ended up getting.
Seeing that the support and suggestions came flooding in, should I have tweeted, “Shut up, you’re making me look like a Twitter hog!” Never in a million years would I do that or want to do that. Ugh.
For people who don’t like it, you can come and go as you please. I do not use Qwitter. I believe in freedom and privacy. Follow your own bliss…and leave me to mine.
My bliss last night came in the form of a stellar Twitter community.

Pssst! Due to many resquests, I put some of the best (according to me) suggestions down below in the comments.

Filed under Myth or Reality, News, Social Media | Tags: kids sleep, parenting, social media, Twitter | Comments (10)

scheduling the freelance writer’s day

October 9th, 2008

My family is currently marinating in an incredibly structured schedule. It includes meals, naps, errands, cleaning, dates – the whole shebang all carefully mapped out. At first it freaked me out, whatever happened to just letting things happen, right? Not really…

We’ve been at it now for about 2 weeks, and I can’t begin to tell you what a difference it has made in our lives. All four of us have entered some sort of rhythmically syncopated, ulterior universe that is lulling us all into, well, a happy place.

So, all of this order and ease, got me thinking – the daily life of a Freelancer is somewhat similar to the daily life of a house with two 2 year-olds and two 85lb. dogs. They both include:

an extraordinary amount of work
frequent distractions
multi-tasking
incessant demands from needy customers
messes
successes
things that beep, whir, bark, whine and blink at you
undulating energy levels
and, total exhaustion.

So, why shouldn’t a structured calendar also transform my life as a freelancer? Think of all the time that will not be wasted because I’m efficiently shuffled from one task to the next. I already succeeded in turning off my social media while I was writing a project, this seems like the logical next step.

I’m going to make my calendar now…and then I’m thinking about a one week challenge – to really see if this raises the bar on my productivity. Yes, I will schedule Twitter breaks throughout the day. And, yes, I’m hoping I don’t have to hire an office mom to make this work.

Anyone want to join me in this endeavor?

UPDATE: I’ve had a fantastic response to this challenge, brave souls, each and every one of you! I’m away for the long weekend, so here’s what I propose: take the weekend to work on your calendar. I’ll post mine here by Tuesday and we’ll begin on Wednesday morning. I’ll also send you all an email to remind you, bust on you, and even, possibly inspire you. Thanks for your patience on the start date, I have to go to Vermont, my family is making me take a vacation.

Can’t wait to see how we all do and what we find…