Freelancing as a full time job has never been something I've remotely thought of. While I sometimes fantasize of a life of sitting around in my pajamas while my laptop burns a hole through my thighs, I would never go so far as to say sign me up, with enthusiasm. It's a discussion I have had repeatedly over the years which is why I now bring it to this forum. My argument has been and remains that I love, love, love my job. Yes, I deal with wholly difficult people but who doesn't? Then again if I was a full time freelancer, I would get to work all alone. Which is ideal for a misanthrope like myself.
Then there is the safety net of knowing that no matter what I will be getting a paycheck next Friday. I will have money for retirement and Blue Cross will come to my aid when I'm having a panic attack because of said job. Then there's knowing that if I need a sick day or vacation then I get the day off and chances are no one will bother me. There isn't that pressure, as Paula pointed out a few weeks ago, to try to get it all done because every single thing is up to me.
I've found myself among a bevy of really talented writers who have made the leap from corporate America or a desk job either by choice or because they just had it in them, either way, they've jumped and have gone to have the difficulties that such a major career choice brings. And during regular conversations I wonder how in the world they do it. This is often after I've complained or needed consoling while trying to meet various writing deadlines and working 50+ hours a week. That said, I wouldn't change this arrangement for anything in the world because I love what I do and I love that I get to write when I feel like writing. But there isn't the pressure there to continue search and seek out writing opportunities as if my livelihood depended on it.
There are of course two sides to every coin and grass is greener syndrome. But what I wonder now and what I've always wondered since making the acquaintance of various writers is how exactly people cope? What makes you decide to go on the road less traveled? One that doesn't necessarily have security (but does any job?) yet makes you sublimely happy?
Kristin Luna recently converted to the full time freelance life in San Francisco as a successful travel writer. Moose of Moose in the Kitchen has been a freelance writer and then cubicle drone/freelance writer and now back to freelance 24/7. And Sarah Brown quit her job last year to become a fulltime writer.
Heather Barmore really wishes she had the talent to freelance full time instead she puts all of her creative energy towards No Pasa Nada.
]]>That said, it is summer in a time of who knows what? 'Economic uncertainty' has been way overused so I'm just going to say that it is summer and perhaps we should all do a little soul searching when it comes to our budgets because this whole $65.60 for a tank of gas BS has caused my right eye to start twitching. I have totally become that person who eyes the gas signs through out every state I visit and I sometimes even think about how much gas I could get with just five dollars. With the increase in prices, families especially are feeling the burn as school is out and summer vacation starts. Money Saving Mom has great tips on how her family has embraced $4 a gallon gas:
1) High gas prices have encouraged our family to slow down and stay home more.
A go-go-go lifestyle isn't healthy for anyone, so I'm thankful for the
motivation to reconsider outside activities and commitments and pursue
a simpler, more relaxed pace in our life.
With the rising cost of everything it is only natural for people to think about how to cut corners to save a little cash. Especially on seemingly superfluous things like the gym. Thankfully with warmer weather comes the ability to take the workout routine outdoors. I have a bit of the running bug (don't ask and the way I do it...well...I look like an injured fawn) and while in some ways it might be cheaper, I have completed three 5Ks in four weeks to the tune of $25 a pop. For all you non-math majors that is $75 that I actually paid to torture myself for 30 (ok 30 PLUS) minutes. This in addition to new sports bras that actually do what they are intended to do and that I must purchase new sneakers ASAP due to overprotonation and shin splints. By way of Frugal Babe, Free From Broke figures out just how frugal running really is:
People pay hundreds in gym memberships and buy expensive machines for
home to workout when a simple run may be all they need. What’s it take
to run? Go out and move faster than a walk! But then I thought about it
and I realized running can be expensive as well.
And finally it is summer and that means hellacious travel. It also means that I will be spending 40 days of the next two months away in various hotels around the country. Ever since I started excessive travel I have always wondered one important thing: How much to leave for the maid? Seriously. I think about it constantly and never know if I leave too much (not that there is such a thing) or too little. Usually I just take whatever is spare and in my wallet and leave it at that. Dollar Frugal has a post about maid tipping and whether or not parents should teach their children the importance of leaving a good tip for their maid. For the record mine did which is why I am anal retentive about it now.
Anyway, I just want to know your opinions. Should the parents
have given their daughters money to tip their maids? Are the daughters
responsible for their own room tips? Do you think their parents
probably didn’t teach their daughters to tip? Are teens not generally
tippers?
Heather Barmore is not very frugal and writes about it at No Pasa Nada. For the record she really would love to be.
]]>
The reason? God, I wish it were better and stronger other than hitting my limit of irritation but it was because of a coworker. A single coworker who is not a superior and whose faults I could list in paragraph form in bound book that would make Tolstoy jealous. But I will not go there because this isn't about how difficult this particular person is or that I had been warned, it is about my reaction to the difficulty. The way I stormed out and decided right then and there that enough is enough and that it would be a cold day in Hell before I ever helped him again. Let's just say that the way I reacted was probably not one of the finer moments of my career. In fact immediately after when I was full of rage there was this sudden jolt when I realized my supreme ridiculousness as I marched down the street to find my boss and immediately told him that I announced my intentions to quit but obviously I hadn't quit and he went to get a glass of vodka and told me that I would not be quitting. Ever.
I doubt that I am a perfect colleague and I would never assume such. I do know that when it comes to entering a new environment (a year is still considered new, correct?) where it is normal for people to stay for at least a decade, it is hard to ease your way in and try to find your groove. But I've been trying to go with the fow and do what I need to do and to ignore everyone else and to focus on minding my own business as opposed to worrying about what Joe in cube seven is up to right this very moment. I just don't care. I'm not an apathetic employee when it comes to the organization as a whole I am just not interested in the comings and goings of those around me. Of course I have been greeted by the utter opposite by those in my surroundings which leads to the unpleasantness and then gossip and then disgruntle employees and well, for those in an office environment; Have you ever noticed that more often than not all of the rumors tend to come from the same source? It all goes through the same channels and tributaries to spill out and it feels as if it is the job of one (or a few) to make office life generally unpleasant.
So how does one cope? Like besides quitting because anywhere you go there will be difficult people. Not everyone will get along and as JEMi from InMyHeels said, it would be nice to get a bit of a warning when about to enter into the land of difficult people:
Wouldn’t it be nice, when beginning a new job, for there to be fine
print about the type of atmosphere you just got yourself into? How
were you supposed to know that in this shiny new office with freshly
sharpened pencils that Miss Thing to the right likes to let the team
take the work…all the time. Or that Miss Thing to your left gossips
for breakfast, lunch, and all the snack times in between?
But we don't get a warning so it is our job to not only figure out how to do what we have to do in order to get the precious paycheck but also to teeter around those that love nothing more than to invoke annoyance in our lives. Lucel Juliana has a list of Do's and Don'ts when dealing with difficult people. All of which might seem like the obvious answers but when in the throes of reiterating to your colleagues that your job is really none of their business so perhaps they should just shove it, well you try keeping a level head:
DON’T…
- Take it personally. When you take it personally, you get emotional and lose the ability to think logically.
- Go on the attack. Stay calm and keep your comments brief and don’t say anything out of anger and frustration.
What I love about this list is the Don't Take it Personally suggestion. Which is always easier said than done because it is hard not to take it personally when it feels like the office jackass keeps goading you even though everyone else has already pronounced him (or her) a bully or a gossip it still can feel as if all of their bad vibes are concentrated in a laser beam towards the center of your head. The good thing - you know if you can find the good among the madness - is that the difficult to deal with culprit has probably been at it for ages. EVERYONE seems to know about him or her which is why when you are finally exasperated and tell other colleagues that you are thisclose to losing it, they just nod in agreement and fire off the stories of just how awful a particular person can be. An article from Wall Street Journal's Live Mint examines turning office conflict into an alliance:
It’s not your imagination. From the petty to the pesky, conflicts in
the office are on the rise due to a younger and more diverse workforce,
according to experts. A recent study by a Canadian professor found that
“workplace bullying,” meaning things such as yelling, criticizing,
spreading gossip, excluding workers and insulting colleagues’ habits,
can be even more harmful than sexual harassment.
Safety in numbers, I always say. Also more witnesses for proof that the office culprit really is a jerk. And if worse comes to worse and let's face it, none of us are completely mature, there is always someone else to commiserate with and misery loves nothing more than company.
Heather B. has always worked with difficult people and when not having a freak out she just writes the rage away at No Pasa Nada. It's all anonymous of course and always about her reaction but some days it does the trick.
]]>All that being said I do firmly believe that it isn't just book smarts that get people to where they are. I mean yeah it's awesome that I have a penchant for Salinger and can recite European History in both Spanish and English but what really gets people together is something on a more basic level. Like golfing or as I read recently in Now Public by way of the BBC, it could be cookies. Which I find both odd as I actually do bake for my coworkers so that we can find some common ground like chocolate. But also interesting because in the US we're known for being serious and talking business over golf is a tad more popular than talking business while dunking cookies in milk. And still I am intrigued by how it is all done outside of the little USA bubble:
About four out of five UK businesses believe the
type of biscuit they serve to potential clients could clinch the deal
or make it crumble, a survey says.The outcome of a meeting could be influenced by the range and quality of biscuits on offer...
While also catching up on my personal finance news and going through a quick quarter-life crisis of sorts, I happened upon a post by Well-Heeled, with a mission in which she projects on the cost of graduate school. It made me both nauseated since graduate school is something I seriously think about day in and day out. But sometimes my excitement for this new adventure in higher education is trumped by the drastic cost of learning. Like it will cost my entire salary for like a year and half of Master's level coursework. Yet settling for my current level of education isn't something I am willing to do so I will go forth and go broke:
By all accounts, a full 2-year program will cost in the ball park of
$120,000+ for tuition, books, and living expenses. As of right now, I
can take out $20,500 per year in Federal Stafford Loans. My family has
also indicated that they’d be willing to help out (for which I am
immensely grateful). The rest will probably be a combination of
personal and private loans.
And finally, I am that business traveler who gets on the plane and prays that a baby won't sit next to her on her 50 minute trip to DC. Sad but true. It has nothing to do with not liking babies but because I like my sleep. I am also that traveler who gets rather defensive towards other passengers offended towards airline boarding policies and plane travel in general. There is this very large part of me who wants to shoot back towards those who are all upset over how airlines operate these days and treat families to say, "While you might find this all unfair, try going on 62 flights in less than one year. 62 times going through security and having TSA rifle through your luggage making sure that your face wash is in a 3oz or less size container and also checking out your undergarments. THEN and only then can you complain." But I say nothing and just sit back and relax to see how others will react to travel especially now that summer has arrived and planes will be overflowing with business travelers going to conventions and families headed to Orlando. Here is an excellent post from one of my absolute favorite writers on summer travel for less:
Seek last minute vacations.
Want a weekend away but failed to plan anything in advance? Not a
problem. If your departure and arrival times and location are flexible,
you’re the prime candidate for budget travel. Most airlines sell
remaining seats a week or so in advance for a much reduced price. Check
out airfarewatchdog.com or lastminute.com, which post weekend travel
fares from one to 10 days beforehand, or else visit your preferred
airline’s website to see what kind of last-minute deals you might find.
Heather Barmore discusses all of the above and more (like with extensive paragraphs and quotes, etc.) at No Pasa Nada.
]]>Having one’s mother mail rotating boxes of old clothing is just one of
the myriad ways that young newcomers to the city of a certain income —
that is, those who are neither investment bankers nor being floated by
their parents — manage to live the kind of lives they want in New York.
Every year around this time, tens of thousands of postcollegiate people
in their 20s flood the city despite its soaring expenses. They are high
on ambition, meager of budget and endlessly creative when it comes to
making ends meet.
After my graduation I recall a visit with my mother. We were driving through Ward Circle in Upper North West when we got to talking about work and how she felt going back to work after having children and how she really wasn't all that fond of children in the first place and because of this she would only take us to the park when other working women went to the park: At dusk. It's Ok. We live in Upstate NY the only people out after dusk were farmers and police officers on horseback. But ever since that conversation and watching the way my mother worked, I have always wondered how things changed after she had me and then my brother. I do know that she had our Aunt babysit for us and she would come home once a day to nurse (I come from a family of rampant breastfeeders) and to say hi and to cuddle and yet I wonder if things changed for her workwise. Actually not if, but how. Which is the same question that Linda from Sundry asked of her readers:
How about you? Are you in a good place, job-wise? Have you changed the
way you think about working as you’ve gotten older? Those of you who
are staying home with kids, do you plan to go back to work at some
point, and if so, will you pick up where you left off — or do you have
different interests now?
Now I am that working woman. A single working woman but a working woman who sits just a few feet from her mother. I am that working woman who travels for work at least once a month sometimes for just a few days other times for a solid week but each time I return exhausted. Each time I get home and immediately plop on my sofa only to be nudged by my cat who I then shove off the sofa because I cannot be bothered. My mother had the same travel schedule way back when my brother and I were mere babes and probably came back utterly exhausted and in no mood to deal with children. It's not as if business trips are vacation they are work. Tedious and boring meetings and receptions where you spend the entire time wishing to be in the comfort of your hotel room under the covers with room service. So I would imagine that she felt the same way as Kristin feels in her new column at Work it, Mom:
I had some time in LA between client meetings, and I pulled my rental
car into a shaded Starbuck’s lot, fighting the urge to recline my seat
and close my eyes for a few minutes. Business trips as a single Mom,
for me, are a tangled concoction of elation, focus, guilt, fatigue, and
pride that I am somehow juggling this, making it happen. And I want to
keep getting better at it.
Which brings me back to my mother and overall career decisions. I've said it before and I'll say it again: Sometimes you just make it work. You don't know how and it might seem next to impossible. But somehow, someway, we get up each day, put on our big girl panties and find a way to make it work.
Heather B. just returned from a six day business trip to DC. She is exhausted and still living paycheck to paycheck and yet she makes it work and lives to tell about another day at No Pasa Nada.
]]>Speaking of tanks, the economy is tanking but that is nothing new. What is new - at least for this relatively new adult - is the way the way the economy is on a downward spiral of doom and gloom. And to the next person who tells me that they heard on CNN/CNBC/NPR that gas will get to SIX DOLLARS A GALLON - which must be said in all caps to fully understand the gravity of the situation - well that person gets punched in the face and then I get the pleasure of using their credit card to get my $123 worth of premium. Needless to say I'm starting to become depressed by this entire situation and I sound like my grandpa when talking about what the world is coming to when the economy is in such dire straits. Then I like to just rest my eyes though I'm really dreaming of how I will be spending my stimulus check.
For the record, I plan to stimulate my savings account.
And it's a good thing that I have started to save seriously and count each penny (high fives all around for not overdrawing from my checking account) because the economy is tanking and we're in a recession and next thing you know, I'm unemployed and possibly working at Banana Republic as opposed to rolling around in their cardigans. Though I am not a Gen Xer, a recent USA Today article looked at the plight of the debt squeezed generation above me:
This generation is in the ironic position of paying for their own
student loans and feeling the pressure to put away for their own kids
for college," says Tamara Draut, a Gen Xer herself, a new mom and
author of Strapped: Why America's 20- and 30-Somethings Can't Get Ahead.Gen Xers also face this harsh reality: The standard of living that most
of them have so far managed to achieve falls short of their own
parents' standard at the same age. The median income for men now in
their 30s, when adjusted for inflation, is 12% lower than what their
dads earned three decades earlier, a report by the Economic Mobility
Project, an initiative of The Pew Charitable Trusts, concluded.
The thing about Americans though is that we have never been a group of people known for wanting to wait things out or to really contemplate long term solutions. Getting the average worker to contribute to their employee matched 401(K) is like wrangling 499 geese into a pickup truck for a cross country drive. It takes willpower and threats of not being able to retire until 89 and even then people hem and haw. The concern that plagues the average American right now is how they will be able to afford things right now. That means the rising cost of the basic necessities like milk and gas. The New York Times' Paul Krugman recently opined that the cost of driving has left people 'stranded in suburbia':
It’s the kind of neighborhood in which people don’t have to drive a
lot, but it’s also a kind of neighborhood that barely exists in
America, even in big metropolitan areas. Greater Atlanta has roughly
the same population as Greater Berlin — but Berlin is a city of trains,
buses and bikes, while Atlanta is a city of cars, cars and cars.And
in the face of rising oil prices, which have left many Americans
stranded in suburbia — utterly dependent on their cars, yet having a
hard time affording gas — it’s starting to look as if Berlin had the
better idea.
Strangely enough I had the same discussion with my mother the other day. That if I still lived in Washington, DC with my paltry salary, I would look at the price of gas and exclaim that it's such a shame for those poor suckers driving around in their gaudy H3s. I would then hop on the metro and life would go on. But now? While utterly trapped in the suburbs with the worse public transportation this side of the Atlantic? Where I drive 20 miles ROUND TRIP to my office? Well, re-read the first paragraph and you might need some smelling salts to help you come to, as well.
Of course the short term problems don't end with the ever important food and gas but also housing. The housing crisis has been prevalant for months though a recent article on CNN pointed to the growing trend of homlessness due to the rising costs of housing among the middle class:
Nancy Kapp, the New Beginnings parking lot coordinator, said the group
began seeing a need for the lots in recent months as California's
foreclosure crisis hit the city hard. She said a growing number of
senior citizens, women and lower- and middle-class families live on the
streets."You look around today, and there are so many," said Kapp, who was
homeless with her young daughter two decades ago. "I see women sleeping
on benches. It's heartbreaking."She added, "The way the economy is going, it's just amazing the people that are becoming homeless. It's hit the middle class."
And that there, the story of Barbara Harvey is a harsh reality of what the current economic climate is doing to people and the fear that has and will continue to set in. When seeing everyday 'normal' Americans aversely affected it resonates with the rest of us, the other middle class normals who feel like we're doing just fine until we realize that by the way things are going, well, it's a little bleak. As part of Recession 2008 - and catchy title makes it more like a phase and not so "I'm going to lose all my money tomorrow" scary - Businessweek has started a blog called Recession in America which will chronicle the current recession or the recession yet to come.
And now I am off to look at my ING account longingly and to whisper sweet nothings to my 401(K) for being so good and thankfully, robust.
Heather B. considers a good day in personal finance to be when she doesn't overdraw from her checking account. She also blogs at No Pasa Nada.
]]>I could go on and on and on as I have over the days, about how I find it unfathomable that my teeny tiny brudder is being allowed to graduate. I could wax poetic about the type of person he's become. The person who triple majors and enjoys WEB DuBois while I sit around reading People. But instead I'm left rigid in fear because dude needs to find a job. And quick. I'm simultaneously being all casual and blasé about it as he applies to Best Buy because apparently they provide health insurance. The other more practical side of my brain is freaking the hell out for him because HE HAS TO FIND A JOB. A real job. And if I remember correctly, from that whole six week period between graduating and the day I first say in my cubicle and wept tears of joy, well that period is about as enjoyable as a cinder block between the eyes. Of course, that's only what I remember of it because I preferred to stay consistently liquored up, you know, to stave off the pain.
I'm far enough removed that I can sit back and give some sort of half-assed advice about what it's like to walk across that stage and want to stop time because this cannot possibly be happening. When you're 21 or 22 you hear your name being called and for me, well I was praying that there would be some sort of rift in the space-time continuum and then I said a little prayer that I would not be forced out of my nicely built world of comfort, sparkly ponies and knowing that I would eat at least three times a day. It's something greater than the knowledge aspect, a lot of people are book smart and the ability to recite Adam Smith is a nice quality but it's there's this huge thing that is happening. This one thing that kept from running across the stage naked screaming FREEDOM! It's the personal responsibility for everything that happens next after walking a mere 10 feet. It's fear of the unknown. Of making these huge decisions while trying to figure out the right career path after everything leading up to that one moment of diploma retrieval is driven by what one aspires to be, there's the part upon realizing that it might not happen. I only remember that fear now that I'm so far removed. As I sit in my cushy office with my cush salary for the cushy job that I've always wanted as I contemplate my very cushy first world problem of what kind of vehicle with four wheel drive I'd like to purchase.
Though I would like to tell my brilliant baby brudder that all will be well and he will not end up homeless or unemployed for the rest of his natural life, I can't because he won't listen because this whole not having a job thing sucks and sucks the life out of a person. Though momentary, the whole job/money/career path of possible doome thing isn't something that is given fair warning. When graduation arrives, speakers and faculty and parents like to say bullshit like you'll do great! You'll go far! You can be whatever you want to be and your future is bright! They neglect to mention the minor caveat that you might end up in some thankless awful job photocopying press releases and contemplating tossing yourself off the nearest bridge. They don't say that this thankless job could last for years and your boss could be the dumbest person on Earth. No one says, "You're gonna be one broke mofo for like 10 years" or "Living paycheck to paycheck builds character!" or "Even though you hate this job and this has absolutely nothing to do with what you really want out of life, you have to pretend to be happy or risk living under an overpass!" No one tells you about health insurance or 401(K)s or how having no savings feels like you're suffocating. Hallmark doesn't have a card for College graduates that says, "Now you know why adults are miserable. Welcome to Hell!"
I don't want to scare my brother or his fellow graduates into thinking that their lives will suck from here on out. Because they won't. They will fall and falter and be incredibly unsure. There will be moments where there is literally no money whatsoever and the choice between rent and food will be an actual conundrum. There will be those moments of coming to grips with the sad fact that the perfect job with six figures, an assistant and the company car, might not come to fruition for quite sometime. There will also be the moment when what was once the most perfect job ever in life might not be all that so plans might change. Then some know it all 24 year old just three years out of college will try to sell some clichés on how it gets better, promise. But it won't get better that quickly and it's an easy case of being on the other side of the fence. The side where things seem so much more stable - though one should remember that absolutely nothing is for certain and let us now pray that I still get paid on Friday. It's not perfect but it's that confidence that comes when allowing things to come and go and build while somewhat confident that though things aren't perfect they're just fine. And that 24 year old know it all will tell you about looking upon those poor, defenseless graduates thinking about how they're such suckers. But if they wait it out, just a little while longer, it will get better. Especially since after being drunk and unemployed things really can't get that much worse.
And for the first time ever I can say hoo boy, was all that thankless crap worth it. Here's to living paycheck to paycheck, never calling the boss a dumbass out loud and not getting puketastically inebriated at the company Holiday party.
More poignant advice for recent college graduates:
Sense to Save advises graduates on money
Career Super Star gives advice to his niece
And Jennie S. Bev discusses PJ O'Rourke's LA times Opinion Piece on Commencement Advice.
Heather B. has been writing extensively about the really 'awesome' time that she's had since college at No Pasa Nada.
]]>It's not that I have brand loyalty or keen eye for home style but when I was asked recently about how one should decorate their first! place! my answer was a succint "Ikea. The end." Then I half expected dollar bills to fall out of the sky for passing along that information; "Awww yeah" I thought while nodding "Mama's gonna get herself a SNILE chair and some INREDA bookends". Though now I suppose I could throw in a Target for good measure though with less enthusiasm because it seems I ENJOY putting together my furniture with the most complicated instructions possible because then I get cool textiles for $0.39 to boot. But back in my day the only option for furniture that was passable for something you might want to sit on without risking a stray bar to the bum but cheap enough that you wouldn't be making choices between a bed and being able to eat, well those options were fairly limited.
My first apartment was an 850 square foot studio. That I shared. With another human being. And all of her belongings. And without any sort of wall or anything. Just a whole lot of open space and subsequent ill will. If you ever have to share a studio, don't forget to build a brick wall or at least a shower curtain. There are times when looking back upon that time, which was only five years ago and I marvel at the way I managed to a) not commit any rash acts that might put me in jail and b) have a furnished apartment with cutlery and matching wine glasses and all without losing my lunch over the pricetag. You want to know how? IKEA. THE END.
Publicly displaying my love of cheap furnishings and the act of spending hours putting together a chair with 98 screws and an allen key, really couldn't come at a better time. You see it's spring. The time of renewal and also the time of college graduation. Right now is the perfect time for parents and their 21-22 year old offspring to have a little 'Come to Jesus' discussion about how the child will have NO MONEY. And while having NO MONEY the child will have to live somewhere and the child can sleep on the floor if it so chooses but it would be better off sleeping on an actual bed or futon as that would lessen the chances of back injuries and people with no health insurance can't really afford to have an orthopeodic injury.
When I first moved, I surveyed my space and found that the most heartening part of the whole new found utter FREEDOM thing is being able to decorate my space with my money. 'Designing' is the first of many awesome things that occur when becoming your own person with your own things. Whether that be an entire apartment or half of a studio. It's a space to do with what you will while ignoring the whole NO MONEY aspect. The point is this is the first time to be able to do it up in a space entirely your own which doesn't mean spending all the money that you don't have but using what you have as a budget guide to find things that are functional but also fun (see: POLARVIDE throw). Use professional design sites to do the guiding. See what you enjoy and then emulate for half the price. I hate boring spaces which is why my current walls are turquoise but I also like to make the little space I do have while being cheap (My motto seems to be spend a lot on shoes but spend little on the thing you sleep on every night. Becoming my own person doesn't mean that things have to make sense).
It isn't as if IKEA will cure all that ails you and causes tulips to rise in your wake it's just that it's cheap - fine inexpensive - and rarely boring which is the key to all things that one considers doing when between the ages of 18 and 25. Sure we might enjoy thumbing through the pages of Pottery Barn and it might be just lovely to own a couch that you didn't have to hog tie to the top of your hatchback, carry up four flights of stairs, then put together yourself only leaving bloody nubs for fingers but! It is a right of passage, buying items for your first home away from your parents (even if your parents may or may not be paying for said apartment) (ahem). That freeing feeling of knowing that yes! You are in fact perfectly capable of picking out bedding and a mattress and the perfect walk clock and desk/bookshelf combo. Just remember that you can do this crazy thing called SAVE (you know once you get yourself hooked up with a job and money) and one day live a life where someone else might deliver your mahogoney furniture already assembled thereby greatly diminishing the risk of needing anger management while putting together furniture.
Suddenly I see my future and it is bright and does not involve carpal tunnel courtesy of the world's smallest wrench or ugly carpets.
Great furniture sites:
Fosters (I bought some amazing stuff there this weekend)
And design Sites for inspiration:
Design*Sponge (Grace has a link to great finds for less than $100)
Heather B. also blogs at No Pasa Nada. She is currently sitting on her MALM bed staring at her REDO wall clock.
]]>Over the years I have slowly learned to quell my need to
scream right back when someone screams at me. Call me crazy but I would
rather remain gainfully employed than be right 100% of the time. I
remember one event during which I screamed in a member of Congress'
office at the Representative's Legislative Director because he was a
jackass and no one liked him but I was the only one who had it in me
(aka was stupid enough) to yell back. And this is how events have
played out on more than one occasion: The office asshole screams, I get
tired of the screaming and blatant rudeness in a quest to prove their
power and so I decide to yell right back. I would not recommend madness
even if there is a method to it which would be to force the obnoxious
and perpetually disgruntle offender into realizing that perhaps they
should tone down angry rhetoric before that little vein in their
forehead explodes.
The above is the perfect example of a "yelling circle" or
so I imagined after reading an article at Career Diva on how a boss
perpetuates the circle of yelling:
But the other night I realized that my yelling is not lost on Circe. I
yelled at both my kids about creating a mess in the kitchen right
before we were supposed to have dinner. Well, later in the night I
heard Circe yelling at her brother Cheiron because he took one of her
toys. I told her not to ever yell like that, but I realized I probably
started the yelling circle.
Boss yells and so employee becomes just as annoyed as the boss had been
and starts yelling back or at others in the immediate vicinity. I've
seen it happen countless times while working in high stress
environments. In these cases it seems as if the only way to get a point
across is to yell right back even if common sense says to just leave it
alone and let it go or to walk away. There is that tiny almost visceral
need to defend one's honor and to fight rather than flight as the Work
Coach congratulates an emailer for doing:
I just started working for a boss that screams, not yells, but screams
at everyone. You have to walk on eggshells around him until you can
figure out his mood. He did to me for the first time last week, and I
calmly crossed my arms and leaned on his desk and told him “I know you
are having a bad day, but don’t take it out on me.” He quickly calmed
down and we walked out of the meeting laughing.
Sounds like you did exactly the right thing when he blew his stack. You
didn’t escalate and actually managed to calm things down. But you are
also wisely staying aware and documenting. There are bosses who lose
their temper a lot, but it sounds like yours is WAAAY over the line.
This guy probably needs real anger management help.
Though that last part seems a bit lofty and unrealistic to
think that all employees will take the high road and all bosses will be
understanding and the stress of office life will not cause either party
to blow their lids. But that's like expecting for people to not be
human and to ignore that automatic defensive mechanism that turns on
after several blows. When I fought with my boss several weeks back I
told my mother - who works on my floor - about what had occurred and
her Mama Bear mentality automatically kicked in. To be honest I've been
lucky. I've been able to say my piece multiple times then afterwards
things are just fine and both the boss and I feel better and can
continue to peacefully coexist in the same office space. Now that I
know that I'm not the only person on Earth (shocking) to experience the
boss and employee dance of bitterness and walking on egg shells; at
want point is enough enough? None of it is right especially since we
are all adults who can 'use our words' even two year olds know that.
But it is a realization that can only be seen in hindsight and it
forces me to wonder how and when exactly the "yelling circle" will end.
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When people come into my office they remark on its emptiness. It's so "clean" and "neat" and "sterile". They look around startled probably because they had no idea that there was actual carpet on the floor. Everyone else in the building has the same paper piles everywhere. The cheap flimsy file folders in stacks along bookshelves. I find myself to be the antithesis what with my lack of usage of the printer and photocopier and my crazy ability to file emails to the network drive as opposed to printing out each and every one to have it stare back at me for 15 months straight.
I've remarked to my colleagues about how much paper we use. They 'poo-poo' those claims because I must be the nutty one. "Oh that crazy Heather Barmore", they say. "She and her talk of recycling". And then to prove their point they toss a plastic bottle into the regular garbage can. While I sit in a corner and rock back and forth because it is so very maddening.
I wouldn't call myself a particularly 'green' person. But I do have a problem with general waste and so I try to be conscious of what I use. Especially this day in age when not every single thing needs to be printed out and put into a three ring binder. A three ring binder which is now collecting dust on a shelf somewhere. It's probably the blogger in me. The anal retentive geek that comes out every once in awhile to announce that instead of killing 987 trees for something that I will never, ever read, one could just make a website or a wiki to aggregate and disseminate information.
But like I said, that's just crazy talk. So to answer my own question, my office is not very green. Though word on the street is that they're aware of this and working on it, starting with the paper problem. And would you like to know how they got this information to the staff at large? A three page memo.
At some point I turned off my laptop since my brain was on
complete overload. Keeping up with all that blogging encompasses is
stressful in and of itself. Throw in a more than full time job and I'm
sure that there are people out there who are shocked that I haven't
spontaneously combusted due to the stress of it all. From trying to
keep up with two different non-stop worlds. Which is where the New York
Times article intrigues me; bloggers who are trying so hard to keep up
with the 24/7 world of social media:
A growing work force of home-office laborers and entrepreneurs, armed
with computers and smartphones and wired to the hilt, are toiling under
great physical and emotional stress created by the around-the-clock
Internet economy that demands a constant stream of news and comment.
It's something that I can appreciate, that the internet never stops. I
spent last weekend with several bloggers who were on 'vacation' but
during their vacation they still had to work because the sites they
write for needed updating. The internet doesn't go on vacation nor does
it care when it's a holiday; people are still reading. And with
blogging in particular, for many - certainly not all - it requires so
much more than just posting as Merlot Mom has pointed out:
As a SAHM, I find this efficiency a challenge. Worse, now that I'm not
"working", others who do work, consider my complaints unjustified. I
used to get sidetracked by dirty breakfast dishes, a pile of soiled
laundry, and phone calls but I've traded these for another
time-consuming distraction: blogging. Not the writing part. To spend
endless hours writing is my dream. No, it's the blogosphere learning
curve: blog administration, marketing, social networking. The blog
world is enormous and learning how to navigate it is overwhelming.
While all of this is understandable what was lost in this article and
what By Jane and Web Worker Daily pointed out is that much of this view is
'one-dimensional'. There is a whole slew of bloggers who are able to
blog and live their lives without completely overdoing it:
It’s certainly possible to overdo in the blogging world - but that’s
true of just about any occupation, from management to software
development to, well, you name it. It’s also possible to find a level
of web work that allows you to have a life, with children and pets and regular meals and vacations.
Of course, the folks who find a balance aren’t sensational enough to
write news stories about. From my point of view, though, the real news
is in the ever-increasing number of people who manage to work on the
web without feeling that their lives are remarkable.
I am a blogger who also works in politics. Both of which can be easily
overtaxing and stressful. And there are evenings when I go to bed
realizing that I need to be up in four hours to finish three separate
posts and then to go to work for 12 hours and then come home and
whoops! Forgot to post something. But I also know when enough is
enough. And it doesn't mean that I want to be any less successful or
that I am not passionate about either work but it means that I am not
about to stress myself out about things which in the grand scheme of
the world, are not that huge.
So last night, I closed my laptop when I realized that there was no way
that everything that needed to be completed would get completed. Sadly
with only two arms and one brain, I cannot physically get things done,
no matter how well I plan because in both politics and blogging there
is always the unexpected. Perhaps I am destined to be a failure because
I refuse to work, work, work but at least I will be a failure who is
extremely well rested. The problem isn't the nature of the work - all
work is difficult and stressful - it's how someone reacts to their work
and the balance they hopefully can find between their career and life.
One can either stress themselves out to death (which isn't something
that only happens to bloggers of course) or one can realize that pauses
in the space-time continuum are few and far between so maybe a nap or a
week away is in order. I prefer to be the latter.
That is the truth and relaying the truth as it comes to my finances was something that I promised myself I would do when I made the decision to become a personal finance blogger. The choices were to be a blatant liar with perfect credit and a 401(k) since 1985 or I could just tell the truth and wasn't it really funny that time I maxed out all of my credit cards and Visa called me everyday for three weeks? A riot. I decided to be honest about my spending habits and the way my brain has a difficult time comprehending the concept of budgeting because for me and many of my peers this is a reality. The being broke and having nothing to having a little more than nothing and using that little more to enjoy ourselves. Comfortable enough to be able to get a manicure, go on vacation and do other superfluous things, which in my case would be twice yearly trips to Oklahoma as that is how I choose to spend my disposable income.
I actually loathe that term - 'disposable income' - something about it gives me this blah feeling like I'm placing money down a sewer once every two weeks. Not only that but the way in which it is thrown around with an air of disgust by a few because some people have more of it than others. I will admit to getting defensive when called 'frivolous' and 'stupid' until I realized that money is already a very difficult topic to broach without adding the phrase "...and then I went to Coach" at the end of each paragraph. Add to that discussion of disposable income and how much or how little one has after different major life events (house, kids) makes it so much more of a sensitive topic. I have found that people view money with extreme tunnel vision. They understand it from where they sit and I have explained before that it is possible for a person with three kids and a mortgage to see how my spending - as a 24 year old with no kids, living in a city where the cost of living is like $11 - might be vacuous. When in reality it's just that as a 24 year old with absolutely no responsibilities I'm spending exactly as one would and should expect even though when I speak of it, it is often with a bit of hyperbole and enhanced for comedic effect.
Several weeks ago I used my disposable income to go to Austin and then used more of it to go out to dinner during which I commiserated with two other bloggers about my open and honest discussion of my personal finances and the reaction to it by others. And during that dinner I used my disposable income to bribe these two bloggers in order to persuade them to write about their disposable income as well and lo we found ourselves in the same boat using one hundred dollar bills as oars.
We are two twenty-something attorneys with no children. When you have two people, no plans to have children, and no large financial obligations, other than the requisite student loans that are financed at 2% and consequently not a real worry, it’s hard to get serious about budgeting.
So that’s what we’re spending on. What are we not doing? Thinking long term. We try to be mindful of what we spend on, but we do not have a real long term financial plan. I think it is difficult as a twenty-something to think about how the money you have now will be working for you in thirty years. But it is really something we need to address. We do not want to be looking back at this time period when we are in our 50s and regretting not having a financial plan. But the sad truth is I have no idea how to go about this.
My third category is my everyday spending: i.e. the eating out, the movies, the countless songs I buy on itunes, Target and Anthropologie. When I look at this everyday number that I spend I'm sure I can cut it down to half of that and put more into savings but really what is the fun in that? Luckily I don't have to save right now for kids college or anything else that is going to cost me hundreds of thousands of dollars. I'm lucky that if I see a pair of shoes and I want them I can get them, this is the good thing about being a single, but the bad thing is having no one that I am accountable to except myself.
I found these two perfect for this experiment because of where they are in their personal lives and how it relates to their spending habits. I was especially fascinated by the conversation in Slynnro's comments as to how others spend, especially the number in our age bracket who admitted to not thinking about the long-term. Which left me in mild shock but unable to hop upon a soapbox given that very long period of time when I thought that saving was holding on to a twenty just in case of an emergency. An 'emergency' being a really cute shirt on sale at JCrew. Most importantly though, I was shocked at this line of thinking as it shows a marked improvement in how I deal with finances and I am more curious now than ever as to how those between 20 and 30 spend or save and how people past this age bracket spent or saved in the past.
Over the past week plus I’ve witnessed a rather spectacular blogging and marketing mess of confusion. That’s the only way to adequately describe the debacle that I’ve been referring to as “Camp Babygate”. Before I go on I feel compelled to say that I’m writing this as a complete outsider to the situation (I don’t have children and so it would have been impossible for me to have been included or to feel hurt for not being included). I am Switzerland and I’m enjoying some wine and trying to digest and comprehend.
The synopsis is that Johnson & Johnson invited 50 ‘mommybloggers’ to attend a midweek conference called Camp Baby. I would imagine that the thought behind this melding of the mommyblogging minds was that Johnson & Johnson knew how much of a force to contend with mothers who blog have become. J&J is the ultimate baby company and figured that they could and should tap into this market, offer up some products, and get the word out via the blogging vehicle. In the following weeks more and more women invited started blogging and twittering about whether or not they would be attending the conference. Innocuous enough, as more of their fellow “mommybloggers” heard about Camp Baby the more chatter started as to who was or wasn’t invited and why. All was still relatively fine. About two weeks ago as the event became more popular and women were finalizing details things seemed to unbuckle at the seams.
Some of those invited felt that they had been “uninvited” as they learned that nursing babies weren’t allowed at the camp because it was a “mother’s getaway”. And others were uninvited when Johnson and Johnson who would be paying for women to travel and stay at the event, was unable to accommodate specific travel arrangements as these bloggers were unable to attend the event in its entirety. All I can say about the various arguments for being upset with Johnson & Johnson is that some seem more valid than others but fine.
Julie from Mothergoosemouse was uninvited after she started to make travel arrangements to get to the airport and mentioned her nine-week old Oliver who would also be attending:
Yesterday, I emailed the organizer who’d approved my attendance to advise her of this change to my arrangements, and she asked if I was planning to bring my infant to the conference. When I confirmed that yes, I would be bringing him along and keeping him in a sling with me, she advised me that, in short, I could not attend with my baby in tow. That Johnson’s Camp Baby had been planned - by mothers - to be a baby-free getaway.
Stefania Pomponi-Butler was ‘uninvited’ as she finalized her travel plans and requested a tweak in her travel needs based on a speaking invitation that she had already accepted at the same time in New York City:
Hi there,
I have already purchased my ticket for the BlogHer conference...I would need travel to J&J on Tuesday to arrive the night before the camp starts. Then I suppose I would need travel back to Manhattan for the BlogHer conference. Is that do-able?
MARCH 15
from Stefania
to redacted < redacted @rfbinder.com>,
date Sat, Mar 15, 2008 at 3:55 PM
subject Re: Johnson's Camp Baby Registration Information
mailed-by gmail.comSorry meant to say travel on Wednesday to arrive by 6pm. I can use my own ticket to travel home--i just need a way to get to the J&J camp since I hadn't planned on attending. thanks!
MARCH 17 (I am DISINVITED)
from redacted < redacted @rfbinder.com>
to Stefania
date Mon, Mar 17, 2008 at 2:43 PM
subject RE: Johnson's Camp Baby Registration Information
mailed-by rfbinder.comHi Stefania,
Thanks so much for getting in touch about Camp Baby! (note: I did NOT contact YOU. YOU contacted me, remember?!) Unfortunately, we can only accomodate those who registered to arrive and leave within the parameters of Johnson's Camp Baby. I will be sure to include you in all future invitations and mailings.Take care!
Best,
redacted, on behalf of Johnson's Camp Baby.
Upon the writing of both of these posts and given the wildfire like movement of sharing throughout the blogosphere, it seemed as if everyone and their mother knew of Camp Baby and Johnson & Johnson’s faux pas. Posts and twitters and emails (OH MY!) flew back and forth as women tried to get to the bottom of what had happened and just how horribly J&J had screwed up. Whether or not this massive company had permanently ruined their relationship with the ever-growing group of women or if they would be able to rebound and score with a successful event. The comments in these posts speak far better than I can as to the breadth of thought and in the end these two posts summed up how Johnson and Johnson and PR companies could rectify their relationship with bloggers:
From Susan Getgood:
Where did it fall down? Errors of execution.
They didn't really understand the mom's point of view. Lori told me that they thought it was understood that this was an adults-only event with no child care. Well, yes, it was. Part of the disconnect was that J&J thought that meant no children or babies whatsoever. Mommybloggers, however, likely interpreted it simply as no child care.
What J&J didn't understand was that a mom with a very young nursing baby might expect something called Camp Baby to accommodate her and her infant since the whole point of bringing such a young baby was that the mother couldn't be separated. In other words, she didn't need child care.
And from Erin Kotecki-Vest:
It’s a damn shame these companies, marketers, PR flacks and social media opportunists don’t actually READ the blogs of the Moms they target. They would learn an awful lot in a very short period of time if they did.
They would learn you might not want to ask the Mom with the newborn to ditch the baby and screw that whole breastfeeding thing to come try their products for a weekend. They would learn you might not want to ask the Jewish Mom to come celebrate Easter or say, attend an event during Passover.
Like I said, I have had a week to dissect this stuff and read and re-read each time becoming more and more intrigued as to how big it managed to get. The latest being in response to the part where Johnson & Johnson said that bloggers who attended could write about the event if they chose but it was not an obligation. No signatures signed in blood to write, “OMFG that baby oil is AWESOME”. That said many of the women invited and confirmed to attend are part of the BlogHer ad network. It is stipulated in BlogHer ad network contracts that “Any sponsored trips are subject to the $40 restriction. If you'd like to blog about a sponsored event or trip, please make sure you're posting your entry on a page that isn't running BlogHerAds.” That from the most recent BlogHer ad network newsletter. This means that women attending the event who are members of the BlogHer ad network cannot write about their trip since it is entirely funded by Johnson & Johnson and the trip is worth over $40. If these women choose to write about it on another page on their site that does not have the ad network code then they are allowed to do as they please. I don’t know the contracts with other ad networks but from my understanding there is not the same restriction. So women who are apart of Federated Media for example, can blog about the event as they please.
After dissecting and thinking and discussing as a person who is genuinely interested in how one problem turned into rallying cries against the Johnson & Johnson PR machine. I can only say that while J&J is a huge corporation they did screw up but not in the whole PR armageddon style that others have purported. Their main issue seems to be that they didn’t state on the outset their explicit expectations of those who were invited and nothing more. They should have stated that women attending were to attend the entire event. They should have also stated that women were not allowed to bring children. All of this would have saved days and days of agony and writing and I’m pretty sure all of these women now have a royal case of carpal tunnel. Johnson & Johnson should know the general audience of who they are trying to market but it is NOT necessarily their responsibility to find out the details of the lives of each blogger that was invited to know how each would react to the invitation. That isn’t to say that J&J isn’t responsible at all but they’re a huge company and this is business to them not a personal affront on those who weren't invited or those with prior commitments*.
That’s what I can’t stress enough: It’s business. Both bloggers and companies need each other and need to learn to maneuver through the tunnels of the other side. Bloggers still don’t seem entirely sure how they want to be treated and corporations don’t really know how to approach them. There are faults on both sides but like I said, it is nothing personal. Companies need to keep a level playing field for all involved. In the case of J&J it would be impossible for them to give special arrangements for each attendee. It would be nice but completely unfair to those who could attend the entire event. And while they did screw up in not announcing in large print what they needed and wanted from those they invited, several days of reading has led me to believe that it really isn’t that big of a deal. They have admitted to their mistake and now all involved can move on. The end. Both sides can learn a lot from what happened here in this relatively new space and then sing kumbaya. It’s business plain and simple. Nothing more and nothing less.
*I found out that the Passover brouhaha was over a different event aimed at mommybloggers
]]>So I was mildly delusional and unprepared for the massive amounts of confusion that would sprout out of my early and mid-20’s. Nothing catastrophic of course but when burdened with several years of questioning each and every decision out of fear that one wrong move will totally eff up your life and you’ll end up homeless with a dead end career…well then the hysteria? It ends up kind of maddening. That initial onslaught of trying to figure out the current job vs. future goals conundrum is daunting and it helps to have some sort of community of people who know exactly how you feel at this very second. Even if it is not the biggest thing in the world and doesn’t necessitate the use of exclamation points, there is still this burden lifted when hearing from others who are trudging through at the same time. Elysa has started this great series called ABCs of Gen Y. Here are three of my favorites and includes one written by a ‘BlogHim’:
B is for Balance written by Tiffany Monhollon
It means not worrying that there’s no five-step formula for living a balanced life, even though if there were, I would have a lot easier time writing this post.
The truth is, I have a pretty typically busy twentysomething life: I don’t exactly have balance down yet. The best I get some days is go, go, go, crash. Sometimes, that’s the best I can approximate balance. But hey, I’m trying. And I think that’s the key to balance. Working at it.
C is for Career written by Kaity Mahoney
As I push my way to a seat on the 7:50pm outbound train, I scroll through my blackberry reading the last email of the day. I type a quick note, press send, and slide the device into my bag. Settling in, I begin to think about this post and what it means to have a career in your twenties. At this moment, I feel that it is extremely exhausting - so I think back to earlier in the day. To my morning routine of coffee and emails, to the chaos that ensued with meetings to be had and deadlines to hit - and I wonder, why do I do it? For me, this stress-driven day is what challenges me and keeps me on my toes. It’s what motivates me and pushes me to reach my goals.
M is for Money by Michael Rubin
Your problem isn’t Starbucks.
Many financial experts feel that the problems of the world (and especially of young people) would instantly disappear if we could only get rid of our coffee shops.
Look, if you’re going to Starbucks five times a day, spending $100+ a week there, you’ve got problems. But your money problem isn’t the first one to address. Of course, most people don’t use Starbucks that way, and so what the financial talking heads miss is that nobody—not even the most coffee-addicted person you know—is going to find ten grand a year by pinching pennies at Starbucks.
Like any major life event, the navigation is a hell of a lot easier when there is a group of people on the ride with you, willing to help you read the map. Elysa has built and continues to build a great community of 20 somethings that are more than willing to share their personal experiences with others to help abate that feeling of being alone.
]]>This begs the question as to how exactly I have functioned doing what I do for the past five years. And the answer is: I don’t know. It is still the part of my job that I have found most difficult to conquer. There are moments when I am pretty sure that cranking out 18 TPS reports and dealing with a faulty Xerox machine would be more pleasurable than sipping cocktails and hand shaking. But I do it because I have to. The ‘have to’ even when I really don’t want to is another one of those things that I wasn’t warned about when I signed up for being an adult with a career. I signed up for the health insurance and the 401(K) not being forced into a room with 956 other people who would love to share their life stories.
The last two uber-events that I’ve attended have very little to do with each other. The first being a legislative weekend and the most recent being a little thing called SXSW Interactive. No matter the group - 567 members of the state legislature or 567 Geeks - I still found myself wanting to cower in the background. It’s not just the nerves that get me it’s the always being ‘on’. It is the constant smiling and walking around in heels (though at SXSW I walked around in Chuck Taylor All Stars but you get my point) and the awkward pauses in the middle of conversations and the trying to be at my best and really put myself out there even when I am filled with doubt on both fronts. I am the one who attends fundraisers, casually sips a glass of wine, while lingering in the background. My coworkers are the ones who drag me, half catatonic, into the fray because it is a necessity and I need to learn and it is MY JOB.
Getting a new job isn’t an option and obviously this is all about me and my feeling inadequate even though I am not. I also am surrounding myself with bloggers and politicians, two groups of people who love nothing more than to talk about just how awesome they are (I can and will do it too, so I am not hating) so it should be easy for me to insert myself into conversation but for some reason I just cannot. But like I said, it is a ‘have to’. I have to do it and I eventually survive and get over it but I wonder at times if I am the only person that this happens to. Am I the only one who finds these types of work related events to be daunting and sometimes bordering on insipid? Are there aspects of your particular line of work that you really cannot stand to do but you do so because you have to?
Speaking of SXSW Interactive, several great ladies from BlogHer are in attendance: Lynne D. Johnson, Erin Kotecki Vest and Virginia DeBlolt who I actually saw and didn’t know what to say so I ran away. In my next life I will learn how to use basic English and say “Hello”.
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