Dragon be gone

I finished the first book in Swedish author Stieg Larsson’s thriller series, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, during my family’s annual beach week. I won’t be reading any more.

And it’s not that he doesn’t write a well-constructed, well-plotted thriller. I was even drawn to his odd main character, Lisbeth Salander, the girl with the tattoo. She wasn’t always believable, but she was intriguing and kept me wanting to know about her history.

But I’m sick and tired of books that depend on cruelty and depravity to women for their plots. This book was no exception, and it gravely disappointed me. Too much of what I see on TV and in the movies and in some books depends way too much on depicting women being raped, murdered, dismembered, humiliated, and tortured. And the people who produce these shows, movies, and books believe that we, their viewers and readers, find it entertaining, possibly titillating. More disturbing is that too many of us do, based on the reviews of Mr. Larsson’s books and the ratings for those TV shows and movies.

Really?

I don’t happen to think a good thriller needs to have psychopathic men killing and otherwise hurting women to succeed. And I’m not going to buy or watch anything that uses cruelty to women as its central plot element. What really gets me is that much of what incorporates this cruelty is written/created by people who also claim that they are giving us strong women characters. Yeah, strong women characters like Lisbeth Salander who is sexually humiliated by her legal guardian and turns to graphic sexual violence to retaliate. I don’t think I’ll be holding her up as a role model to my nieces.

Now that I’ve read his first book, I can’t believe how much critical acclaim Mr. Larsson’s books have received. Hoping it would be different, I read the first few pages of his second book only to find it started out with a thirteen-year-old girl locked into some contraption and held prisoner by a man.

Keep it. I’ll go back to Henning Mankell if I want to read Swedish mysteries.

What's in your reading wallet?

This is a confession.

Right now, I'd rather read than write, rather bury my nose than let my fingers do the walking over the keyboard. It's summer and to me, that's always meant books. Books, the smell of coconut suntan lotion (yes, I'm so old I used lotion to get a tan), and the ice-cold inside of a Dairy Queen are the very essences of summer to me. Mountains of books and mountains of hours in which to read. So lazy, so decadent, so perfectly right.

I didn't even realize what was tugging at my metaphorical apron until I read a blog post by my aspiring novelist friend, Eman, and she talked about getting distracted from her work by a book of short stories. Then I realized it was the wish to lie about somewhere, anywhere comfortable and cool and lose myself in a ripping good read for hours and hours on end.

It's June, after all, and I'd like nothing better than to trade the to-do list for the new mystery by Elizabeth George. I don't want anything too heavy or hard to read in June, July, or August when even the beverage glasses sweat. I don't necessarily want to be a better person, or know more facts, or understand literature of any sort better when the summer is over.

Although, I fall crazy in love with anyone who can both write a good story and make me better for it at the end. Marilynne Robinson, Saul Bellow, John Updike, Phillip Roth, Wallace Stegner, Toni Morrison, Virginia Woolf, J.D. Salinger, Tim O'Brien, Susan Minot, J.R.R. Tolkien, Raymond Carver, and Jane Smiley are just a few writers who have done that for me. They are the ones whose books I go back to over and over, sometimes just to look at, sometimes to read a bit, sometimes to re-read.

What I want my summer reading to do is transport me, take me away to some other place, where I can inhabit another world, get lost in it, meet and get to know people I might never meet in my real life. To get to the last page and sigh, "Ah, that was SO good!" These books are also on my summer list:

Little Bee
Netherland
Let the Great World Spin
The Private Patient (by P.D. James who always writes a perfect mystery and has been doing so for years.)
Anything and everything by George Pelecanos
Mysteries by Laura Lippman because we both live in Baltimore and that's where she sets her books.

What's in your reading wallet? I would so love to know!

Living the small life

A friend of mine is struggling with what she wants to do the rest of her life. She is 60 and, having been a successful lawyer and a successful consultant, she wonders what is next. She gardens, she takes in stray dogs, she nurtures a family that includes her husband, a daughter, and stepchildren and much-loved grandchildren. She volunteers at a number of different places. I know how much she has done for a young woman in South Africa.

But somehow that is not enough. She needs a career.

My question is why? What has become of the small life? I know for many earning money is a necessity, not an option. But even for those of us who still need to be earners, why do so many of us seem to be reaching always for more, like a little kid trying to cram as many M&Ms as her mouth can hold, until chocolate dribbles down her chin?

I have come to believe in the small life and its many joys. As someone who has known since about the age of 10 that I would be a writer, I haven’t struggled as others have to define my vocation, my call, my profession.

When I was a teenager and young adult, I did dream of writing the great American novel. That hasn’t happened. Then I dreamed of publishing beautiful poems. And I wrote some lovely ones and made it into a workshop with a well-known poet. The truth, though, is that I am not driven to write poetry. I haven’t made the space for it that such work requires. See, I feel guilty even writing that. But if it had been my call, it would have happened. And goodness knows there are plenty of beautiful published poems out there to love.

The truth is I like my life. Okay, I love my life. I do. I love freelancing. I love having this blog. I love having time to take a walk in the middle of the day. I’m glad to have one dog and two cats to care for and hang out with. I’m really glad for my husband and for our great travels. I’m happy to have a 7th grader to mentor and a church to go to and a tiny little garden and a slightly bigger house in a gritty city.

Does this add up to a big life? No, but it adds up to a fine small one. I’m not going to save the world. I’m not going to walk down any red carpets or sign any autographs.

I am here to praise the small life, the opportunities it brings me to learn exactly how to love my neighbor (by which I mean, friends and family, those pesky people who I take for granted and who know me well enough to call me on what I need to be called on. Loving my neighbors and strangers is a breeze by comparison!). The chance I have to learn to feel compassion for those whose lives bear little resemblance to mine. The opportunity to not resort to road rage, to irritation, to constant complaining, as just a few examples of lessons I am still learning.

I enjoy my daily routine and I love my work, from writing a magazine article about how a staffing association won a legal battle that was cast as a thriller to writing profiles of students who manage to graduate from high school despite having obstacles as big as mountains in their way. It’s call with a small c but it’s mine.

Give me my green with happiness acres and keep your red carpet. I like this side of the fence.

Divin' In

My significant other and I love dives. One of my very favorite evenings in the three years I’ve lived in Baltimore was when we went to hear Arty Hill and Caleb Stine (look them up. Fabulous musicians!!!) at 1919 Fleet Street, a shoebox-sized bar that was last cleaned out in maybe 1970. Somehow, I feel at home in these places, as if I got the honky-tonkin’ gene from my parents’ Texas DNA, despite not owning one single pair of cowboy boots. There are lots of places like this in Baltimore, which also recalls my much-loved Pittsburgh, where, it is said, you can find a church and a bar on every block. Sometimes, the ratio is one church to two bars. Or more.

Every year, I look forward to a friend’s Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer party, which takes place at the Canton Liquor House, another shoebox bar where the owners call you hon and you can get as much Natty Boh or krupnik as you want. For J.’s party, you drink every time Rudolph’s nose blinks and you drink shots along the way too. It’s one of my favorite Christmas parties.

All through my young adult and adult years, my dad loved taking us to dive breakfast places. Mom, not so much, so the tradition evolved so that the kids and dad (and assorted in-laws and grandchildren) would go out to Waffle House or some local place for a good high-fat, lowbrow breakfast every Christmas when we were all home. The Christmas before he died of cancer, we spent a bittersweet hour with him out for breakfast after his doctor’s appointment. My favorite picture of Dad is in front of Rube’s, a now-gone diner in Columbus, Ohio, where my sisters and their families live. He’s got on shorts and a baseball cap and he’s carrying his Father’s Day gifts. He’s also wearing a smile a mile wide because he just had a good breakfast and spent some time ribbing his family. It didn’t get better than that for my dad.

Now, every time B. and I walk into one of our favorite Baltimore diners, I think of my dad and how much he would have loved it. Topping my list of favorites is New Wyman Park, at the corner of Howard Street and 25th. It’s not because the food is better or the place is cleaner or the décor is kitschier, it’s all because of the staff. Though the place has about eight booths, B. and I always sit at the bar if it’s just the two of us so we don’t miss the constant chatter. Owned, as near as we can tell, by a Greek family, several members of which work there as cook, wait staff, and buspeople, the New Wyman Park practically screams “Neighborhood!” The two cooks, one Greek-American and one African-American, are constantly talking to each other, to the waitresses, to the patrons, at least ¾ of whom are well-known, practically family.

We watch and listen as we eat up our scrambled eggs, home fries, toast, and, for B., thin planks of ham. They argue, laugh, yell, reminisce, and kid around, this the most constant form of communication. The banter is what can’t be beat and it keeps me coming back for more. One morning, as we sat somewhat lazy and very fully happy, the then-incoming mayor, Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, walked in. And got treated just like everyone else—with a smile and a hi. But no fawning, no running over. Of course, B. and I couldn’t help but introduce ourselves and wish her luck. We did our best to keep it low key.

New Wyman Park and its inhabitants are the finest of Baltimore, as far as I’m concerned. They are its heart and soul, what keeps me from despairing over the city’s ridiculous crime and murder rate, its swathes of abandoned housing, and its deeply entrenched poverty.

New Wyman Park reminds me that the heart of the city still beats when people black and white, rich and poor, can still gather at places like this, eat some really good food and enjoy each other’s company. Someone said home is the place you go and they have to take you in. That’s what New Wyman Park is to me and they welcome us all, prodigal and otherwise, with a smile and cup full of hot coffee.

Fog free

Returning from a lovely European honeymoon, my husband and I recently took a connecting flight out of Chicago to Baltimore. Once we arrived at O’Hare, we checked the monitors along our way to the gate, and they told us the flight was scheduled to depart on time. When we got to the gate, the sign said the same. We settled into the waiting area chairs and watched the minutes tick by.

It soon became clear that our flight would not depart on time, despite the sign that still told us it would. Several people went up to talk to the customer service representative at the desk. Soon after, she got on the microphone and said, “Attention, passengers on Flight XXXX, we don’t know where your plane is and we don’t know where the crew is so we can’t tell you when the flight will leave.”

Really.

I know you all have been in this waiting area. A low rumble of grumbling ensued. One woman near us declared to her husband that she was going to go get a beer. And she did.

My husband and I just looked at each other. Was the plane delayed in Timbuktu? Having mechanical difficulties? Would it ever arrive? And what about that crew? Were they all sick? Lost? Sitting out in their own small strike? Anything could have been going on and none of us had any idea if we should start diving for alternative flights, sit tight, or burst into tears.

B. went to talk to the customer service representative, who had been making “woe is me” faces while talking to other puzzled passengers. When he came back, he was smiling but it wasn’t a “problems all solved” kind of a smile, more of a “what the heck?!” kind of a smile. It turns out that the plane was coming from a hangar and the crew was in the airport just not to the gate yet.

Next thing we know, she comes on to tell us that exact information and then that there will be “decision time” at the orginal time of take-off. Decision time? What did that mean? The flight had a plane and a crew. And a whole bunch of passengers who were all decided. What more did we need?

The upshot was that the plane arrived, the crew arrived, and we took off about 45 minutes later than scheduled.

Why am I writing about this? Because it is a textbook example of a lesson all writers (and other communicators) need to learn from the time they write their first sentences. Be specific. Do not lose your readers (or passengers) in a big dense cloud of ambiguity and uncertainty.

Readers want to know even more than we passengers did that day. They want you to paint a picture with words that allows them to see what you are writing about, to understand it clearly, to take it in. And for the sake of your client, if you are being paid to write something, you want your readers to clearly understand what your client wants to communicate.

It’s also a great public relations lesson. When the news isn’t good, it may be better to lay it out than to give out information that only results in shaking heads and a room full of frustration. It was far better for us to hear the plane and crew were there but delayed than to hear that seemingly no one knew where the heck either was.

Take a lesson from our hapless customer service representative. Don’t fog up your words when you have specific information at hand and a means to communicate it. Make your communication fog-free. Your readers and your clients will thank you.

Ripoff report

The Wall Street Journal recently published an article about freelancers fighting to get paid. A consultant recommended this site to check on potential employers:

http://www.ripoffreport.com/

I'm happy to report that I've only had one problem client in 13 years of freelancing but have heard plenty of sad stories from other freelancers. And a big thanks to all those prompt-paying clients of mine!

Gone honeymoonin’

My new husband (hmm, I could get used to saying that) and I are off on our honeymoon after a fabulously fun wedding. AlmsInk is taking a break to enjoy her new marital status in a lovely place. She’ll be back to the clients, the keyboard, the bills, and this blog in a couple of weeks.

I could be a steelworker

I lived in Pittsburgh as the last of the steel mills were dousing the fires and shuttering the doors. It was grim, a time I remember as constantly and ominously cloudy. Families out of work, steelworkers with no notion of what they would do next since “next” had never occurred to them as necessary.

Now, I am wondering is my profession going the way of steel? Could I be a steelworker? Here are a couple of blog posts on the topic:

Susie Bright's Journal

Seth Godin's Blog

I’m not a book author and I don’t write for mainstream publications. But when newspapers, magazines, and all those other print publications lay off their staffs, when DC association communications departments can communicate with one-quarter of the staff in one-eighth of the time, I wonder for whom these bells are tolling?

And I don’t want to be a steelworker with no “next.” I know I will be a writer and editor until I can’t hit the keys any more. But I need to rethink the way I make my living and the environment in which I do that. Hard thinking.

It’s a thankful job and I’m glad to do it

“Thank you.” My parents taught me to say that word and say it often. There are days I think I overuse it. Must I thank the telemarketer who calls? But I do. “Thank you for calling. I’m not interested.” Really? I’m not only not interested, I most certainly am not grateful he or she called. But habits die hard and thanking people was ingrained in me from an early age.

Gratitude is something I’ve been thinking about a lot in these difficult economic times. In the past two years, I’ve lost a series of major clients, the ones who pay my regular bills, who keep the electricity and heat on. It’s been hand to mouth ever since because I haven’t been able to replace them.

That’s the gray cloud. This is the silver lining: I still have one major client and a pretty large number of clients who come to me now and then, as needed. They are the ones who have helped to pay my bills over the last couple of years, who have kept this sole provider able to provide services. This is my thank-you note to all of them.

Thank you for sending work my way. Thank you for being great clients, regular clients, clients with work that pays reasonably. If you’re not a freelance writer, you have no idea how many potential clients out there think you will be happy to write for less than minimum wage. Because isn’t it good of them to publish said writing? To them, I say, "No, thank you!"

And I try to make sure my clients know how grateful I am. Thanking them for work. Thanking them when their checks arrive. Taking time to send holiday cards, to have a non-job related conversation with them now and then. To not charge them every which way to Sunday. To occasionally go the extra mile by doing something for free or adding on a little lagniappe. In other words, to make sure they know I enjoy working with them.

Gratitude is so easy. It takes a second and it costs nothing and it pays major dividends. I love watching my young niece’s eyes light up when I hand her a cookie. “Thank you,” she says, eyes round and a big smile on her face. That’s how I feel about my clients—like I’ve just been handed the best chocolate chip cookie ever. Thank you! Very much!

The Tournament of Novels

From First Things website at http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/2010/03/25/the-tournament-of-novels/

The Tournament of Novels
Thursday, March 25, 2010, 9:00 AM
Joe Carter

Did you miss out on the NCAA Basketball tournament because you were reading Middlemarch? Have you ever argued with friends about the merits of Pale Fire versus Gravity’s Rainbow? Then this tournament is for you.

Sixty-four novels compete in a six round competition to determine the Greatest Novel of All Time. Each round of voting, one round per day for the next six weekdays, will begin at 9:00 am and end at midnight.

Choose your favorites from the selection below. Be sure to check back every day to see the updated brackets and vote in the next round.

Go to First Things to vote.

Whistling while you work

I’m a writer/editor. Yes, you say, I know. It’s on your e-mail, it’s on your website, it’s on your blog.

But what I’m trying to say is I’m a writer first and an editor second. When I’m writing, I often feel as if I should pay the client for the fun I’m having. (and, no, I don’t intend to start doing that anytime soon.)

Editing, however, is a different chapter in the freelance life. Though I am proficient at it and have several long-time clients who come to me only for editing, it is just not my favorite thing. The know-it-all part of me loves telling clients rules like, “Spell out the numbers one through nine and use numerals for 10 up. Unless, of course, the number begins the sentence, in which case you spell it out, fill out the dictionary form in triplicate, file it with the grammar police no later than noon on Wednesday, and prick your thumb with blood no later than 24 hours after that.” Okay, I’m kidding about the last parts. But English grammar and punctuation is a murky cave, filled with many narrow tunnels and twisting paths and I enjoy guiding people through that.

Nonetheless, I don’t get the charge I get out of writing, the creative juice-up, the feeling that this is way too much fun.

And that brings me back to my point at long last: which is, every job has its share of chores. I’ve got more editing projects right now than I have writing projects. But I’ve never been one to turn down work, and, times being what they are, I’m even less inclined to do so now.

So, okay, I’m doing more of my second-favorite part of the job right now than my favorite. It is still a part of this job I have loved for 13 (yes, you use numerals for that) years. Can I say that again? Thirteen (catch that?) years. So, if I occasionally have to do editing, which is my second-favorite thing, or bookkeeping, which is very high on the list of things I hate, or filing, just above bookkeeping on the list, well, I still count as one of those people who whistles while she works.

My mother is a great job coach, and she’s always telling me, “No job is perfect.” To love what you do, though, well, that makes everything perfect. That’s what I wish for everyone reading this—work you love, even if you don’t love all of it equally.

The intersection of art and utility

I went to New York City over a long weekend recently to see the Bauhaus exhibit at the Museum of Modern Art. Here’s what struck me most: It was practical and useful. And it was art. The movement brought together painters, graphic designers, furniture makers, weavers, architects, and more to not only create art but to figure out how to make art and craft available to everyone. The Bauhaus school worked on mass production techniques among other things. I was completely fascinated.

And I realized that being able to create for money is one of the things l like most about being a freelance writer. That sounds crass but it isn’t meant that way.

I love getting paid to write and I like knowing that what I write for the most part is useful or for a good cause. It’s fun to figure out how I can use words to convey needed information or to draw someone in to what I’m writing or to teach someone something she didn’t know before. And then I get a check and I can pay bills.

And that’s what drew me to the Bauhaus exhibit, that the Bauhaus artists managed to combine utility and beauty. Even their class schedules were a work of art.

Where is the intersection of art and utility in your work life?

Work hard and be nice to people

Work hard and be nice to people (and animals).

I’m going to put this on a bumper sticker. No need to turn this into an essay when those nine words will do.

Lesson #3 in the freelance writing life: Concision rules.

From the capital city to charm city

For a freelancer, where she lives is where she works. It makes the choice of home doubly important. And as someone who moved regularly throughout her childhood, I’m fascinated by what place means, especially for a writer. For so many of the writers I’ve read, their sense of place, their identification with it, and their ability to write about it as if it were a second skin has contributed to the quality of their writing. Perhaps one of the most famous examples is Faulkner. Another writer I love who seems to have a deep familiarity with place is Marilynne Robinson. If you haven’t read any of her novels, get thee to a bookstore posthaste and pick up Gilead or Home (also Housekeeping though that one doesn’t give the reader a sense of place the way the other two do). Delicious on so many levels.

For most of my freelancing career and for many years before that, I lived in Washington, DC, in the Adams Morgan neighborhood where I first rented a very cozy efficiency apartment that overlooked all the drama that happens on Columbia Road, Adams Morgan’s main thoroughfare. Including but not limited to the Communist May Day Parade, Adams Morgan Day, muggings, and many many honking horns, blaring sirens, and loud voices. I loved it all. The noise rarely bothered me. It was the big canvas to my little life.

Still loving the neighborhood, I bought a one-bedroom apartment on a much quieter and lovely back street, Lanier Place. After years of noise, I didn’t realize how serene quiet could be. I could see the Washington Cathedral from my living room and bedroom windows and enjoyed many a glorious sunset.

After a decade in that apartment with its great neighbors, I decided to move even further away than a block. I wanted a change of scene, a wake-up call out of my comfortable rut. I found it in a move to Baltimore, a place that was very different from DC but not far from the friends I had made over 20 years. And Baltimore was far more affordable than DC so I could buy a little house with a little front yard, a tiny backyard (and an alley--I love alleys), and easy parking. If you know Adams Morgan, you know that all of its car-owning residents salivate over and dream about a parking space. Covered, uncovered, on the street or in a garage, whatever, any reserved space will do.

So here I am, three years later, ensconced in a middle-class neighborhood of white and black residents in North Baltimore, very near the old Memorial Stadium. I really like Baltimore. It’s gritty and charming, an irresistible combination in my eyes though I wouldn’t go so far as to say that it’s the “Greatest City in America” as certain bus stop benches throughout Baltimore proclaim.

Baltimore is like a most-loved sibling who has met up with hard times, maybe of her/his own making, maybe not. I love the way its long-time residents love the city. I love the quirkiness of its inhabitants (seen a John Waters movie lately? He knows Baltimoreans.) and the everyday practical way they view the world. Coming from heady, ambitious DC, this is refreshing if sometimes like having cold water thrown over your head. I feel more connected to reality in Baltimore and both more compassionate and more realistic about the issues we American citizens face, whoever we are, whether poor or rich, gay or straight, from the religious right or the religious left.

It wasn’t easy to leave DC. I grew up there—having moved there in my 20s and leaving in my 40s. A sort of adult childhood, a coming of age into urban living, profession, maturity (well, mostly, on that one). But moving to Baltimore has been like diving into a pool of cool water. Refreshing and a mind-opener. All of a sudden, I'm ready to see what else is out there. What might I learn from my next move? I look forward to an open road leading somewhere out of sight. Having that sense of adventure and possibility while also looking at the age of 50 is exhilarating. And scary as heck. Does one come without the other?

It's this possibility of surprise around the corner that has kept me freelancing for 13 years, and I'm delighted to have discovered I can have it in my whole life too. Here's to leaping!

On the evolution of language

On Facebook the other day, I referred to my “mentee,” a 13-year-old girl I have committed to mentoring through her high school graduation (and beyond as far as we’re both concerned). Two people popped up to comment. One said, “’Mentee’ is an abomination of language. A mentor is not one who ments; ‘Mentor’ is/was a proper Greek name. I prefer protégé as the word to describe that to which you refer.” Another agreed and referred me to Robert Coles’ The Call of Service, which has been added to my reading list.

Then another friend chimed in to say “…I believe all Greeks and Geeks should begin using it often. Why?"

How does a word get into a Merriam-Webster dictionary?"

The answer is simple: usage!”

It made me stop to ponder my use of language. I tend to be in the creative and practical camp, who, like the friend above, believes that usage trumps history. That language can and should evolve, that new words can breathe life into both the spoken and the written word.

I also believe in a formal and informal language so that what I write on Facebook, which I consider a virtual coffee klatsch, an over-the-back-fence chat, is more informal than what I write for publication, be it under my own name or for my clients.

I know there are many purists out there who will argue with me and I welcome that argument. Tell me what was wrong with using “mentee”? Should there be an informal and formal use of language? Are you allowed to write more casually on your personal Facebook page than on your organization’s website?

To the marriage of unlike minds

I’ve been thinking a lot about marriage, mainly because my wedding is coming up in April (to a great guy, by the way, the patience to my impulsiveness, the calm to my storm, my very own amazing travel agent, and so much more.) I was browsing the Web one day and ran across some profiles of long-married couples so, of course, I read them.

Here's a quote from one: “Bill can be very knot-headed about things. When we have our spats, we each speak our mind and then we go on our way. We don’t always expect everything to be resolved or to change the other person’s mind,” says June Pritchard about her husband. They have been married 64 years.

June’s comment about her knot-headed husband (in my relationship, we have an extremely fair distribution of knot-headedness) is a good guide for any relationship, from marriage to friendship to business. I know that I have learned a lot about letting go of my need to be right during my 13 years as a freelance writer. While my clients do pay me for my expertise and experience, there are times when they want to do things their way. I have to let them. Once I’ve made my point (okay, once I’ve made my point twice), I let it go. You know the saying about leading a horse to water?

This doesn’t mean that I’m happy about the product the client puts out and generally, I wouldn’t use that piece as one of my samples. But the fact that the client wants to do things a different way (and, often in my view, in a less-than-perfect way) doesn’t mean I won’t work with that client again. In fact, if the client is a good one, I will happily work again with the client and we see eye to eye or the client takes my advice and thanks me for it. It’s oddly freeing to let someone else do things his or her way. I can let go of it and go on to something else.

I can learn a lot in my personal relationships from my client relationships. Too often, it seems to me, I’m vested in a need to be right about my advice, about what I plan to do, about how I see politics or religion or some other topic. But do I? Can I still be a good friend, a good girlfriend, a good spouse and not be the source of all rightness? Maybe if I don’t need to be the perfect advice giver or life liver, I’ll be a better spouse and friend.

One of my friends is extremely conservative (in my view) and there have been times when I wondered if I should continue the friendship because I’m pretty liberal. Then I realized that my friend’s conservatism was not the sum of all of her parts. She is generous and kind and loyal and more. Should I cut her off because there is one part of her character that displeases me? Beyond merely not cutting her off, maybe I should listen to her views, really listen, not listen with the idea that I’ll figure out how to rebut what she’s saying. Maybe if I shut off my “no” voice more often, I could hear what my friend is actually saying and then decide if I agree or not. Maybe conservatives have some ideas I could get behind. Maybe the political and religious worlds aren’t as black and white, right and wrong as I used to think they were.

Maybe rightness for the sake of rightness isn’t a virtue, after all. I’ll always be a knothead but I’m aiming to know better when to be knot-headed and when it’s just plain not-headedness, also known as orneriness.

A calling

Seth Godin writes a blog about business and he does it really well, often offering up nuggets that go far beyond just business. His blog is at http://sethgodin.typepad.com/

This is from one of his posts:


I know doctors, lawyers, waiters and insurance brokers who are honestly and truly passionate about what they do. They view it as an art form, a calling, and an important (no, an essential) thing worth doing.

In fact, I don't think there's a relationship between what you do and how important you think the work is. I think there's a relationship between who you are and how important you think the work is.

Life's too short to phone it in.

Woe is the freelancer

I have a hardy and hard-to-squelch self-pity gene. Yes, it’s my mother’s fault. That’s a joke, Mom. Really! It's easy to whine when you freelance because you run into situations that call for whining and whining only. Seriously, if you want to freelance, you should be prepared for the woe that accompanies the wow.

Cover your ears, you stoics, turn away, you hardhearted! Because I am about to expound on the woes of the freelance life:

You never know where your money is coming from or how much it will be. Which is why you must secure two or three clients who will pay you a regular sum each month. And despair when they go bankrupt or change direction or fire your contact and dispense with your services. Better than despair is a long client list. Even if they come to you only as needed, they may very well tide you over until you find another one or two regular clients. (And, of course, you should have savings socked away for these rainy days. They will come.)

You have minutes and hours and days without structure. You can do whatever you want. That is bad, very, very bad, especially if you are the creative fun-loving type. Find a daily schedule that works for you and will help you bring in the money and stick to it. Err only occasionally and briefly. Keep to-do lists and deadlines. Post them where they can be seen and referred to as you are typing in the Facebook address for the fourteenth time.

You don’t have health insurance. Unless you buy it. Which is a daunting proposition for one person, let alone a family. Make sure you have it before you jump into the freelance pool. It is your lifeguard.

You will have feast and famine. The famine times will make you believe you will never work again. Feast times make you feel like a millionaire. You’re not. No, you can’t afford that stunning pair of boots. No, a new car is not a good idea right now. Have you heard the one about a grasshopper and an ant? It’s a good one for all freelancers and I’ve learned its truth the hard way. More than once.

You pay employee and employer taxes. I hate paying taxes (I believe in them but I still hate them). I shroud my home in black tulle on April 15 and on the quarterly dates for payment that occur throughout the year. If you want to freelance, however, that is the reality. Make sure you charge a rate that includes this sad reality. And to cover your expenses. No more stealing pens, paper, copies, etc. because you don’t have an employer to steal from. You are responsible for everything from paper clips and ink cartridges to computers and desks. Bear it in mind when working out your hourly rate.

A deadline is really a deadline. No fudging, no putting it off. If you tell a client you will have something done on x date, you need to have it done. Or have a really really good reason why. That’s why I keep my clients updated on my work regularly. If I’m having trouble getting a hold of people to interview, I tell my client. If I come down with the flu (an upside to freelancing-coming into contact with fewer germs), I crawl to my desk to let my clients know.

There is no one to shoot the bull with. And even spouses and significant others may not understand the ins and outs of your chosen career. That’s why formal or informal groups of like-working others are critical. I’m part of several e-mail groups, belong to two professional organizations, and meet with freelancer friends every few months. It’s invaluable—both because of the business you might find and because of the well of good advice and counsel you can get and give.

If none of this deters you, then freelancing just may be the career for you.

Freelancing is the place for me. You?

I’m always surprised when someone asks why I’d want to freelance. I assume everyone would freelance if they could. So why does freelancing work for me?

I’m my own boss. Sort of. Here’s a secret you should know if you’re thinking of getting into the freelance business. You’re never really your own boss. You have clients to answer to, deadlines to meet, taxes to pay. But the dynamic is different. I thoroughly enjoy 99 percent of my interactions with clients because we are on equal footing. I love being the expert writer, even when my clients are writers and editors (maybe even more so then because they “get it.”)

I really love the variety. I work mostly for the same basic type of client, an association or nonprofit organization. But the topics I write about range widely from civil engineering and local government reform in Ukraine to community development and autism research. I’ve loved learning about subjects I would never have read about otherwise.

And I get to do a lot of writing, some editing, and the occasional layout so I can put different parts of my brain to work.

I get to make things. It took me years to realize I have a craftsperson’s heart. I like doing better than strategizing. While I love meetings to come up with creative concepts, I wouldn’t like them so much if I didn’t get to then be a part of coming up with the words part of that concept later. I enjoy putting words to paper to create an article or a brochure or taking someone else’s writing and making it better. I often think of my work the same way a woodworker thinks of her work or a florist thinks of his work. I’m not creating art but I am creating a useful piece of information that someone else needs and it’s often creative, evocative, or lovely. It works for me.

I set my schedule. Hmm, here’s another secret: I do and I don’t. I take great pains to be in place when my clients need me and I have to meet my deadlines. But I get to figure out how to do that and juggle the rest of my life. Some days, even though I'm working away, I still feel like a high school kid cutting class for the day. It’s lovely to have that freedom and to know I can be disciplined when I need to be.

I'm rewarded for work I do as I do it. I like knowing that I can increase my income by doing more work. Of course, the inverse is true as well. The less I work, the less I get paid, something I often think about when my fiancee is home from work on a snow day, getting paid for being lazy at home.

Would freelancing work for you? It’s a question worth taking the time to answer before you jump into an increasingly crowded pool.

Making lemonade

If you're a freelancer by choice, you will probably have a sore neck when you're done watching this video because you'll be nodding yes throughout.

If you aren't doing what you love, though, this lemonade's for you.

http://www.hulu.com/search?query=Lemonade&st=1

The freelance life

I’ve been a freelance writer and editor for 13 years this month. I hoped when I started that this would be my last job before retiring and so it seems it will be. I’ve never been happier with a job though freelancing certainly does bring its share of stress, particularly if you’re single or your family’s sole breadwinner. But it offers many benefits to make up for its shortcomings and I still enjoy my work, mainly for its variety, for what I learn and for the many creative people I have worked with along the way.

I hope you will come with me on this journey of the freelance life…maybe you’ll find out you want a new career, or a new city, or just a bite to eat in a fabulous coffee shop. Whatever you discover through this blog, I’ll be delighted to hear about it!