9.23.2010

My First Real Blog

Last year I spent my free time reading health care bills & going on every message board you could imagine trying to educate people on the REAL facts (both sides were spinning, spinning, spinning) & I got so into it that my stress level shot through the roof. I needed a break this year. Yes, our economy & everything with it is collapsing around us, but I can't dedicate my days to thinking about that. All I can do is do the best I can at my job, help those out there looking for work as much as I can, donate what I can, and try to take care of myself as my health still sucks.

Tuesday afternoon I was reading an entertainment/regular news site that is fairly new & trying to build a fan base. The girl is out of NYC and at one time worked very a very well known magazine. She's now on her own dabbling in various projects, one of them which is her web site. She had mentioned a few weeks ago that she wanted to introduce guest bloggers on the site, which I thought was an interesting idea. The topic of Tuesday was "Dancing with the Stars" from the previous evening. Most readers had missed it but were looking for a recap.

I don't know why I was watching that horrible show Monday night, but I did. I was in pain, flat on my back, and it was the only thing really on as I couldn't physically go on the hunt to find a good DVD. So I watched it. My mom & grandma love it, so I've watched it in the past as it gives us something to bond over. I have little to bond over with my mom so that's a big deal. So the web site owner throws out the challenge: "Anyone willing to do a write-up on the episode?" I don't know what I was thinking - it was probably a combination of pain meds & the pain literally driving me insane - but I took her up on it & she accepted. I ate dinner and then spent the next 2-1/2 hours writing the recap of a 2 hour reality show about D-list stars attempting to dance.

After I put up the post, I was shocked to see the positive comments from fellow readers. Turns out my snarky yet not-too-cruel humor and tendency to get a bit descriptive in my writing works. So out of the blue I had my first published write-up on an up-and-coming web site. It's not like I'm writing things for Time Magazine, but I felt a small sense of accomplishment. It's not the first time I've had something published, but it is my first time to have a blog write-up published. To my shock, I've been officially asked to cover the show weekly during Season 11 and have accepted.

I've been struggling a lot, specifically over the last year, about my career. I have a good job & make good money considering I don't have that all-important four year degree. I went immediately to work instead & built my career that way. Sometimes I regret it, but when I look around me most people my age who went that route are doing worse than I am. I control the numbers & manage human resources, but this isn't my dream job. I actually hate compiling numbers. Results are interesting in the analyzing process, but I'm not someone who loved math as a kid. I tell people I work with numbers because it pays the bills and I've found luck in those types of positions, but in reality it's not what I want to do for the rest of my career.

So what do I want to do? My husband asked me that question outright a few weeks ago when I was having a mini-breakdown over my job, pain & overall stress. "I want to write" came blurting out of my mouth without a second of thought. And the more I think about it, the more I realize that was the genuinely true answer.

I hated the owners at my last job, but I loved one huge piece of it - writing. Whether it was writing presentations, reports, proposals, marketing pieces, web site language or more importantly - articles - I loved it all. I couldn't have survived there had I not had those opportunities.

When I was very little I was obsessed with being a doctor. Then music entered my life and I wanted to be a clarinetist, which lasted up until our move senior year where that dream was shattered by things out of my control. But when I think back, the one constant in my life has always been my writing. Scoring in the top 1 percentile every year for national Writing/Reading/Language testing is obviously a rarity. The fact that I had several short stories and poems published in national school journals is a rarity. My grandma telling me from a very young age that "Some day I think you're going to be a great writer"...maybe she was right. I'm not being arrogant, but being praised for my writing is something I've had my whole life from more people than I can count. I'm definitely better than average and I love it, so maybe I need to really explore this. The ideal goal in your career is to do what you love, right?

It's easy in life to get caught up in what you have to do to survive. All of my adult life I've done what I've needed to do in order to put a roof over my head, food on my plate, etc. I've been happy with my success, and find myself extremely lucky that I'm not only able to provide the basics, but that I can also take good vacations, eat at some of the best restaurants in the country, and not have to worry about things that a lot of other Americans have to worry about right now. I am incredibly grateful for that and I don't take it for granted.

But what I've concluded is that to follow your dreams you usually have to be willing to suffer. You have to be willing to take risks, put your financial future on the line, face a lot of rejection & hurdles, and have the willpower not to give up. It was easier to do this when I was younger, healthier, and just having to look out for myself. It's harder now considering my own health challenges and the fact that I'm one half of a pair of people sharing a life together.

I definitely have a lot of thinking to do, but it will have to be done around work, health issues & living life. At the moment I can't do a whole lot to lead to my ultimate dream career, but I can do things little steps at a time when I can fit it in. For me, this blog was a huge awakening, and I'm so grateful for the opportunity allowed to me and the realizations its helped me discover.

9.14.2010

September

It's not just September, but mid-September. The last few weeks have been spent stressing over my job, but also doing some traveling to Frederick, MD, D.C. & also Cincinnati to see family, friends and to also just enjoy some time with the husband. It's been nice to escape a few times, especially since the upcoming months will be mostly hell.

The software conversion that has been going at fairly slow speed this year is about to rev up big-time. We're fast-tracking it with a go-live date of December 1. Since I'm the project manager/coordinator for everything, this is a very daunting task to add on top of my other normal workload. I've tried to prepare the best I can by training others & bringing in some extra help, though that process itself has not been smooth or necessarily as helpful as some thought it might be.

I feel I'm a bit in over my head on this one. Not because I can't do the job, because I've done several conversions before that went off very well. It's because this time I'm dealing with pain that I can't control & I don't know if I can maintain the level of focus & long work days that this project needs. But I have no choice - it has to get done. They say you can rest when you're dead; hopefully in this case I can rest when the project is over.