The Importance of Butterflies

When I was little, Sundays were my least favorite days. Not only because of Sunday School, but because, I think, it always felt like an ending. Saturday, you were in it. But, Sunday, even though it was 40% of the weekend (including Friday night), felt doomed. The steady advance of the clock swallowing up any remaining freedom. I wasted a lot of it, I’m sure, mourning for it’s inevitable departure.

I had a physiological and emotional reaction to Sunday. I named it – in true writer fashion – when I was about 7 years old. I know that my mom (who reads this blog) won’t remember this, but I do. I was trying to tell her how I felt, because it was so, well, sad and intense. My interpretation was that I had my ‘Sunday Feeling’. Eventually, this became the term that I used to describe that particular brand of sadness whenever it happened – Sunday or not. Clinically, I think it would be identified as depression. The Sunday Feeling feels bottomless and lost, a little bit scared and incredibly still. And it still creeps up on me every now and then.

See how I’m a classically tortured artist?

I like to name things, always have. Like the time I told my 1st grade teacher, Miss Carragher, that I was carsick. She told me I couldn’t be carsick sitting at my desk – but it was the only reference I had for nausea at that point, being in the car. It made perfect sense to me. That woman never understood me.

But, Friday, glorious Friday. It held so much possibility, you know? It was the day you spent planning and dreaming up the weekend, the expanse of the two days to come spread out hugely in front of you. And, just like the Sunday Feeling, the Friday Feeling also and quickly became unattached to the actual day.

The Friday Feeling happened on the last day of school, and on the first. The Friday Feeling happens at the beginning of a relationship. The Friday Feeling happens when you get a call about a great project. The Friday Feeling happens when you can’t stop writing and everything just works. The Friday Feeling feels topless (as in the opposite of bottomless, not as in shirtless – though sometimes that could apply), full, purposeful, gleeful. The Friday Feeling has butterflies attached – they fly around in your gut, your chest, your throat.

To me, the butterflies are the drive behind the Friday Feeling. Their movement, after all, is the surest sign that you’re leaving the despair-filled stillness behind.

Image credit: Laura Burlton

Reason 1020 to Hire a Copywriter or the Power of the Myth

So, I’ve been working on a copywriting project for a client whose business is travel. My assignment revolves around Egypt – so I’ve been bandage deep in mummies and pharaohs and tombs and Gods. And it’s all reminded me of something that I find fascinating: mythology.

For instance, there’s the myth of Isis. You see, the Ancient Egyptians believed that when the Nile flooded every year, it was just from the annual crying episode of Isis – the Goddess of Motherhood, Magic and Fertility (and by the way, whoever tied those three things together for her was frickin’ brilliant, right?) – as she mourned her husband Osiris.

As crops and lives were destroyed, the Egyptians were ‘apparently’ able to handle the devastation with a smack to the forehead, “Oh!” They would exclaim. “It’s just Isis again…and no one messes with a heartbroken woman.” Or so some might simplify and suppose.

It doesn’t have to be Egypt, every culture has these myths and they serve one main purpose (besides entertainment and education): myths provide a logical explanation for something that is illogical, out of our control or just terribly hard to understand or deal with. For instance, why the Nile floods every year causing destruction and death or why mosquitoes buzz in people’s ears or why the sun appears every morning and the moon rises every night. Ultimately, myths provide comfort.

Rolling the dice…so to speak

Imagine a product – not an extraordinary thing, but one that a lot of people are making – like a slot machine. Realize that people (maybe not all of them, but a lot of them) are confused by this machine just like they’re confused about the cycle of the ocean tides. They accept it, but they’re still thinking why? why do I need this? how does it work? why would I want to play? and possibly, will it help my crops grow? (Um, yes, if you win and the slot machine spits money out at you). Their reaction to all of this ‘not knowing’ might be fear, it might be trepidation, it might be avoidance.

But, you run a casino, so you don’t want them to respond with fear, trepidation or avoidance. You want them to enjoy and seek out the slot machine. Which is where the copywriter comes in. Copywriters are the creator of your slot machine myth. We write the story that makes all of those consumer people relax and say, “Oh! Now I get it! The slot machine has a logical purpose – there’s nothing to fear! In fact, what I just read made me feel so good and calm and in tune with the slot machine, I want to go play with one.”

We explain, we provide answers, we bridge, we soothe. Our myth is your story and the place of connection from consumer to product, client to service…and sometimes even ancient Egyptian to the Gods…

Image credit: Valerie

The suspense could, quite possibly, kill me…

It’s not quite as glorious as it sounds. I figured out how to see and control my future. But only my bleak one. And bonus, it’s very easy to do – anyone can play!

This magical skill that I’ve developed is born from an inability to deal with anticipation, with not knowing. In other words: the suspense is killing me.

In reality, I only have one question that I need to have answered. If you look at all the story threads that I have in my life (work, writing, relationships, health, family, etc.) – I want to know one thing and one thing only: Will it turn out for better or for worse?

Like I said, the suspense is killing me. So, the brilliant thing to do is just kill the suspense, right? I mean, if you think about, it is completely in my power to make sure none of those things come true – and then I’ll have my answer: it will turn out for worse. I can stop writing, I can stop running and I can sit around all day doing nothing but eating hotdogs, using Twinkies as a bun. And, just like that, I don’t have to wonder if the fame, glory, health and dollar bills are headed my way. I’ve taken control of my future and satisfied my curiosity.

Yeah, not gonna happen.

I would never purposefully sabotage my life or my pursuits just to abate my anxiety. But, you’ve got to admit, there’s something really seductive about knowing that I could. That if I really needed my answer, I could get it. It’s like the ‘myth of control’ loophole.

I do want to see the future, how this will all play out, NOW. But, I understand…that’s not how it works. How it works is that we show up for it, we move in it, we talk through it, we write about it…and eventually we find out what’s behind those elusive curtains.

And you know what? I believe it’s all good stuff back there. Don’t you? If we didn’t, we’d be much more tempted to chuck it all in the trash…wouldn’t we?

Image credit: The Real Estreya

Reason 930 to Hire a Copywriter or Most People are Bad Liars

Jack, my 3 year-old son, has two moms, he calls us Ma J (that would be me) and Mama. And he has learned to lie recently. Though, sadly, he has only has one lie in his repertoire, he just varies it from situation to situation.

When ‘Mama’ isn’t around, he whines pathetically at me:

“Mama said I could have ice cream! Mama said I could!”

“Mama said I didn’t have to go to bed! Mama said I didn’t!”

“Mama said I get to sleep with my Lego guy. Mama said I get to!”

Let’s be clear, he doesn’t lie well. I mean, I hesitated the first time – but it’s been straight down hill from there, for him. He’s lacking in creativity, yes? Clearly, he needs to expand his game.

Why do people lie?

It’s upsetting that he’s learned to lie, of course, and it’s made me think about lying in general and why people lie. I think it’s about fear. And need. And control. And survival. In his case, he lies to get what he thinks he desperately needs for his survival – like ice cream or his favorite Lego guy. Basically, people lie because they don’t have confidence that their truth is going to get the job done.

So, why is lying Reason 930 to hire a copywriter? Surely, not because I want people to lie! But, because I want them to do the exact opposite. We all have these deep needs and fears and the desire for control and survival – and so, sometimes, you watch companies lie (badly) to try to convince people to use their product or hire them – because of their terror that no one will – which will mean that they’ll go out of business, lose all of their money and die. They’re afraid their truth is not enough.

As a copywriter, I don’t think you need to lie in order to run a successful business. In fact, I think people, potential customers, can smell your desperation and your disingenuousness. And what many people don’t realize is that they don’t have to lie. They have a great story, they have a great platform – something that makes them worth buying, something that makes them stand out from the crowd. But, they can’t see it and don’t know how to say it.

Copywriters do.

We know how to ask the right questions, listen to what you have to say and then pull out the gems and build the story. It’s what we do. We see your truth, write it and make it sound fetching, irresistible.

Gotcha

Because, you know, most liars get caught…and it’s just terrible.

It happened to Jack the other day. There he was, not wanting to get dressed for the day, on the verge of a break down, when he reached into his back pocket and pulled out his go-to trick: “Mama said I didn’t have to get dressed! Mama said I didn’t have to!” Only this time, whoops, he was talking to – yes, you guessed it – Mama.

The moral of this story: don’t lie to your customers. Be proud of who you are and what you do. If you can’t make it sound just right, hire a wordsmith to help you.

And, also: never, ever lie to your mother.

Image credit: Denis Giles

I’m with SportsCenter

I have a thing for SportsCenter. There’s something about ESPN that just really does it for me. And I know what it is (besides the overflow of testosterone). This news media outlet is not scary. Every other news station out there tries to reach out, grab your eyeballs and attach them to their screen with teasers like, “How we know you’re going to die a violent death and HOW YOU JUST MIGHT, MAYBE, POSSIBLY BE ABLE TO STOP IT!!! Next on the News at 10.”

But not the guys at SportsCenter.

They love the game, the love the athletes, they have fun. And when there is drama – cough, cough ‘Tiger’ – they somehow still manage to stick to the facts and not so much the soap opera, focusing on what it will mean to the game of golf. I know, it’s mind-blowing.

This morning I was at the gym, and while I really abhor TV, the screens are inescapable. So I make sure that I’m stationed in front of SportsCenter – just in case my Eye of the Tiger concentration should get distracted. Which it did. And I found myself watching highlights from the Olympics  – where yesterday, Lindsey Vonn and two other U.S. dudes won gold medals. And then I was watching crazy basketball highlights where huge men were leaping gracefully into the sky at just the right moment, catching the ball and slamming it into the basket.

Makes me tingle

I got shivers. Everything I saw was so beautiful, so extraordinary. It made me work out harder, feeling my own strength and power. It also made me think about Elizabeth Gilbert’s TED talk. You know her, right? She wrote Eat, Pray, Love – a masterful memoir that is so authentically real it’s almost blog like. Almost.

In her talk, which I highly recommend that any human (but especially us creative types) watch (and I’ve posted below), she talks about creative genius. She talks about the fact that now that she’s ostensibly hit her ultimate peak with her last book, it is expected that she can only go downhill with her highly anticipated follow-up.

Ah…fear-based wisdom

Apparently, this is a typical phenomenon for anyone who has reached such heights. As she notes, she topped out at 40, so she has 40 more years (give or take) of never being quite that good again – according to this fear-based wisdom, that is.

Lindsey Vonn is 26. When she gets home in a few weeks, will she sink into a deep, dark depression and think that she’ll never be that good again? Will others assume that as well? Is this, then, as good as it gets?

I’m going to say NO. And I’m going to say it in a very loud and strong voice. Because ewwww. Who wants to live like that? I can tell you that I do not.

Waking up

When these professional basketball players woke up yesterday morning, they knew they were good athletes, they knew they were strong and agile. But did they know exactly how the ball would come to them during the game? Did the know exactly how they would jump and twist and grab and dunk? No and no.

Gilbert discusses the unrealistic expectations we place on geniuses to be genius…and it made me think about what’s coming next, what we can’t see – how maybe some thing, some accomplishment, some physical and creative feat is still out there, around the corner, barreling towards us.

Yesterday, I (and Writing Roads) had a really, really good day. When I woke up, all I had was me – my knowledge of who I am and what I want to do. The rest lay before me sight unseen. I had no reason to think the day would unfold like it did, but as I sat on the edge of my bed, ready to put my feet on the floor and get moving, I thought, Who the hell knows? Maybe today will be the day that things really come together. Maybe today will be my best day yet.

And it was. You know why? Because I’m with SportsCenter. I’m not in it for the fear. I’m in it for the love of the game and its players and my team. And because I really do think there’s always somewhere farther, longer, stronger, better and higher to go.

Image credit: jjaani

The Sense of Write

I have an uncanny sense of smell. Seriously, I’ve broken up with people over it. Not because they liked the smell of lavender while I insist on freesia and lilac, but because they didn’t smell right. If this writing things doesn’t work out, I might become a pheromone detective.

My nose is my directional. And this week, it stopped working. It’s a little bit completely amusing because I wrote a post about voluntarily shutting your nose on the 15th. I can only guess this is the Universe telling me, Not so fast, sweetheart, we still hold the ultimate control card in these parts.

Anyway, it stopped working because I have a cold. For me this is a once a year occurrence, the last time was late last February when I had a full-blown flu. This time, just a wicked head cold.

They say that when one sense stops working, the others kick into overdrive. But, I can’t smell, taste or hear from the cold and I haven’t been able to see since 1983. (I’m practically blind and my vision can’t be corrected to 20/20 even with my glasses or contacts.) So that leaves me with the 5th sense: feel. Except that the cold has usurped that as well. Because all I’ve felt like is crap.

First let me say that there’s something refreshing about not having any of the senses work. While I can’t taste my food, I also can’t smell anything bad. When I was running yesterday (yes, I still ran even though I was sick – I think sweating helps), I couldn’t smell any exhaust. There I was moving up the last hill on State Road thinking, Wow! These cars are all running so clean! It usually stinks out here! And then I remembered. And I can’t taste that nasty cold/sick taste you usually have in your mouth when you’re sick. And I can’t hear annoying people. All in all, not so bad.

But the best news is that I think I’ve developed my own sickth sense: the Sense of Write. My writing has been lip-smacking good. Everything else is hibernating, but my writing brain and my writing fingers are looking for the party. Which is great because I have a lot of work to do. And because it’s one of my favorite things to do. And because my boss refuses to give me any sick time. (So I’m leaving used Kleenex all over her desk.)

Image credit: hebedesign

Cherry ChapStick, Resilience and Non-Hoopla

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!)

Every fish has two sides

This past weekend I adopted this beautiful blue fish to sit by my computer and keep me company while I write. I thought it would be so cool. But, it’s not really cool. It’s two other things:

Depressing. As hell. I kid you not. I look at this little fish all alone in his little bowl with his fake plastic plant and I want to end it all right here and now. I mean, talk about a reminder of how fruitless it all is! She’s trapped, she has no options, no real future, no chance of making any friends or finding love or even just someone to fool around with. And she only gets to eat a few tiny pebbles of food a day, the same food every day.

Luckily, that’s only what I see about 3% of the time that I look at her. The rest of the time, I think she looks extraordinarily

Chillaxed. My fish is so mellow. She just floats around. Sometimes she’s very still, sometimes she swims up and down or in circles. But nothing seems to bother her, she never looks ruffled. She is totally safe in that bowl. It’s clean, there’s food, there are pretty rocks. She doesn’t have to work and she has no responsibilities. In short, she’s living a charmed life. Like Paris Hilton.

And – minus not having to work or shoulder any responsibilities – like me.

Image credit: ayelie

Dang. Another Fork.

Remember in The Muppet Movie when Kermit and Fozzie are driving along and the map says there’s a fork in the road and they look up and there’s actually a huge fork sticking out of the ground? I frickin’ love that.

The frog and the bear were following directions, so they knew which way to go when they came upon this fork. But the rest of us aren’t always that lucky. Like me, today. I’m writing and everything’s going just fine and then I get to this place – it’s my fork in the writing road. And I have no map.

Suddenly, I have a choice. I’m writing about the importance of having community as a blogger – and I can focus on the virtues of the greater collective or I can highlight the benefits of having a few key people. There’s not room for both in my post, but the real issue for me is this: it’s hard to let go of either option. What if I pick the wrong one? How will I ever know what might have been? And, no, I do not have time to write it both ways and then pick. But, that’s a nice fantasy.

As I write this, I realize that the Zen take on this dilemma (Alisa – you’ve corrupted my conscience!) would be to embrace the fork not as a ’split’ or an ‘either or’, but as a bastion of opportunity and abundance! “Wow – look at that,” I would say. “I can choose option A and then write another post about option B. Lucky me!” But, I don’t want two posts. I want one. The right one.

My July birthday makes me a Cancer, ruled by water and the moon and my emotions and passion. Apparently this means that:

• I cling (you know, with my crab claws).
• I have needs that want to be filled deeply and immediately.
• I have an aversion to failure and opposition.
• (Oh, and I don’t like to be told what to do. This has absolutely nothing to do with this my point in this post. I just like knowing that this isn’t a character flaw, but an astrological fact that is beyond my control. Can someone call my all of my teachers, K – 12, and let them know? Thanks.)

Back to my point, something happens to me psychologically (or metaphysically? or astrologically?) when I have to make a choice between two ideas. I clutch them both tightly – and when I finally choose option A, I feel like I’ve failed option B. I don’t like the disparity that is inherent in making the choice.

So, quite often I find myself staring at my computer screen – contemplating the death of a thread in a post. Interestingly enough, the Muppets give me a nudge out of this pothole at the end of the movie with their final song. It goes a little something like this:

“Life’s like a movie, write your own ending, keep believing, keep pretending…”

I think Kermit just told me to fake it till I make it. And I think Kermit just told me that I literally can’t get it wrong. I just need to choose…and keep driving.

How do you handle forks?

Image credit: Dcosand

Surgically removed

On Tuesday, my baby girl, the fruit of my loins, is having surgery. I’ve been effectively not thinking about this for weeks. But now it’s right here, days away. It’s a supposedly easy, out-patient thing, but she has to go completely under – and, well, it’s surgery. And she’s so little.

She’s having surgery to have her adenoids removed because she can’t breathe and because we’ve tried everything else and because they’re causing her pain and discomfort and hearing loss and tooth decay and god knows what else.

So, I’m trying to find something good here in this situation – because to sit around and worry is, well, really stupid. And here’s what occurred to me. There are times when I have tried everything, when I’ve explored every option – but the pain and discomfort and god knows what else is still there.

How cool would it be if surgery were an option for me? There are some things I’d like to have surgically removed. Like my knack for procrastination and people that don’t use their turn signals and the scarcity of time and my intense need for Vanilla Coconut Bliss with carob powder smushed into it.

I’d love to have those things hacked off. Or sucked out. Like liposuction.

In one of my favorite movies, Someone Like You, Ashley Judd goes to the doctor and asks him to remove her amygdala  – the part of the brain that retains sense memory – because every time she smells laundry or vanilla it reminds her of her ex-boyfriend and she’s thrown into a tailspin of heartache. It’s a fantastic scene. Raise your hand if you can relate.

What about you? What would you have removed? You know, if you could do it painlessly, easily, with no recovery time required – oh, and, of course, if your health insurance would cover it.

Image credit: aesop