The Job Situation and Nearly almost 40.

So here's the thing...


My 36th birthday is coming up. I have a Master's Degree in Marketing and a Bachelor's Degree in Theatre. I made a pretty good run of having an acting career, and that was fun. I have no regrets in that area. Now I am dabbling in freelance Marketing here and there doing some editing for a friend and creating a consumer pipeline for another friend. A few things here and there.

The problem is not my ability, the problem is my day job.  If I had sat down and written down the worst possible job for me to have it would be the job that I have. I feel as if I've being punished by a Bond Villian. I work in customer care... taking  incoming phone calls.... and resolving customer complaints... for an Insurance Company!!!! This is wrong on so many levels. For one, I am a supporter of Universal Medicine. That can be discussed later and is not the purpose of this particular blog post. I merely bring it up to illustrate that my own personal dogma disallows me to be compatible with my job at which I spend 40 hours a week. I literally have to tell people stuff that goes against the core of my beliefs. For two, the job consists of having to deal with being yelled at a lot. People are upset when their medical treatments are not covered. Go figure. And since I'm the figure-head of what they believe to be the decision making entity, I'm the one who gets yelled at... cursed at... pleaded with... bargained with... cried at. Mind you, I have no actual power over anything. All I can do is read them their benefits and explain the existing claims. Some studies have shown that when a house plant is regularly yelled at it does not grow as well as one that receives positive verbal communication. What then does this kind of regular negative input do to complex thinking mammals?

In the mean time I am most certainly looking for another job, either by moving up or moving out. Every position that comes open within the company that I even remotely qualify for I have applied for. Plus, I peruse Careerbuilder, LinkedIn, Helpwanted.com, even Craigslist with a scientific regularity. As said earlier, I have consistently sought out freelance opportunities and continue to do so.

During this whole quest thingy, I have slowly come to the conclusion that among my talents and wishes is the need to write. Before I had this job I regularly attended a super awesome creative writers group, which helped to encourage me to seek feedback and continue to create. I had a pretty good roster of short stories building up... until my computer's hard drive crashed and wiped everything out. (And yes, several people have looked at it. There is no way to get the data back.) That really threw me for a loop, so combined with the new job I just haven't written anything significant since then.

But the thing is... That's what I'm good at!

Creative, scholarly, marketing research, PR pieces, petitions, letters to the editor... etcetera, etcetera... If something needs to be written I can normally do a pretty good job. When I was in highschool I was the student whose paper got read to the class. When I was in college, I soared through the assignments that involved extensive writing. As an adult making my way through the world I have been teased for using big words (my original draft said 'using verbose language'). My response to this has been that I do not have a list of what words other people don't know. And to kindly advise them to learn to read a dictionary.

My point is not to brag about what a great writer I am. My point I guess is that I know what I am supposed to do. I even know how to do it. On top of that I have some pretty good credentials to support my abilities. The problem again is my day job.

Sure I can do my best to work around it. But at the end of the day, after being yelled at by strangers, wrestling with two small children, and trying to job search online once the kids are down, I am physically and emotionally exhausted. I have nothing left... I have applied for jobs with Examiner.com and sought out similar jobs. Problem is they all require exisiting writing samples, and like I said my hard drive crashed, so no current samples.

In the mean time, I just keep going. Maybe eeking out a blog post once every six months... if that. So if anyone needs anything written, researched or edited, and you are willing to pay me, let me know.

Because I would like to quit my day job and get started at my career. 

Mulligan

So, once one gets distracted by silly things like NaNoWriMo and what not, one tends to loose one's momentum for blogging. I do so enjoy having such an online presence and folks have chided me for not updating regularly. Alas, I am in the final throws of grad school, flailing blindly towards eeking out my degree qualifications, so this time next month I should be well and truly qualified to, you know, market stuff. So if anyone is in need of some Marketing wisdom, I am the one to call.

How did my NaNo story pan out, you say? Well, the goal was 50,000 words in one month. I think I made it to 8,000. Which isn't bad in my opinion, because that is 8,000 MORE words than I would have done if I had not taken part in NaNoWriMo. My current goal is to round it out at some point and make it into a cute little short story. Currently, it is stagnating in a computer file folder somewhere, with the two main characters frozen in time in a broken down elevator hanging seventeen stories above the basement level of a prominent downtown hotel. I will eventually have to figure out what to do with them....

Today, I am hiding out at the library, truthfully getting some work done (aside from the fact that I am taking a blog break!). I am reveling a bit in the blissful pages-rustling-silence that is the atmosphere of the local library. When one is surrounded by squealing toddlers and grabby-sticky-hands, freedom takes on a whole new meaning.

So as for this give-away. I am leaning towards wristlets, either black and white striped. Or green and purple striped. What says the reading public? Either way, they will have sort of a Tim Burton/ Cat in the Hat look about them. Once they are done, I will post a picture, and on the honor system, draw a name from the current members on the facebook link. Sounds like fun to me!

I have five weeks left in school, and in the meantime I will henceforth try, try to post more blogs. Thank you all for your immense patience.

Writers, right?

So I just got back from a thing at the library where a bunch of writers get together to do writey stuff. These are actual writers, people who submit stuff to magazines and contests and take part in poetry nights, and know what a Seven Crown Sonnet is and stuff like that. My friend who told me about it has actually written and PUBLISHED an actual book. I haven't read it yet, but I will and then I'll have to review it. So here's little ole' me, peering out from behind my notebook saying, "Um, I have a blog?"

The thing is, I felt both wildly exhilarated and completely intimidated at the same time. If I start to go to this regularly then that means that I'll have to actually BE a writer. And write stuff. And let other people see it.

Auuuugh!

But then again, come December I am also going to have a Master's degree. Which means I'll have to do Master's degree stuff. I don't even know where to start with that one.

As far as being a writer goes, I don't know what intimidates me more, the idea of flexing my creative muscles or having to exercise my intellect a little, or both. I feel like the kid who has been bragging that he can bench press such and so amount and is now standing next to his brother's weight bench surrounded by his expectant friends who all have their arms folded and giving the look that says "Oh yeah? Prove it."

Thing is, I've always been a writer. I wrote in the fourth grade when I thought I was reformatting "Cinderella" into a novel, and on through college when I wanted to first be an English major, then took a brief foray into acting which turned into a career for a time. And now, oddly enough, a marriage, two kids and an almost-degree later, I am back to writing.

I always thought that writing was just like acting except it's on paper.

And the people I met today seem most like the kinds of people who would say, you have to start somewhere, and would be supportive even if all I can do is one sonnet at a time, or one chapter at a time, or even just one segment at a time. I'll just have to see where all this takes me. In the mean time I have an outline I need to finish.

And that's how it starts.