Month: August 2015

Spinning Plates (February 25, 2011)

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Ever since I started a full-time job a couple of weeks ago, I have been forced to do something I loathe: admit that sometimes, as much as I want to, it’s impossible do it all. More specifically, I am referring to maintaining this blog, reading the work of other writers I admire and staying up on current events. Sure I have been able to grab some of the headlines: Libya’s Qaddafi the next dictator on his way out, Charlie’s Sheen’s bizarre war with his long-enabling network, Christine O’Donnell’s possible appearance on Dancing with the Stars, and the fulfillment of my secret wish that Eliot Spitzer be allowed to host his CNN hour without the dull as can be Kathleen Parker. Be that as it may, I haven’t been able to engage in the media deep dive I had ample time to enjoy as a member of the mass unemployed community.

I am not complaining. I am enjoying a career fulfillment this year which seemed so remote just eight weeks ago. I love my new position and am enjoying the challenges and opportunities to develop my skill set as a multi-media professional.

But there is that Catch-22. While enjoying financial security through ghost writing for another, I must give shorter shrift to my personal ambitions as an author, ambitions that to this point, have done absolutely nothing to pay the bills or provide a life direction. I get so frustrated with myself sometimes. Why can’t I let things be enough? I was a miserable, depressed insomniac before I found myself in this place. Being solvent again has rectified most of that turmoil, but in it’s stead is a lesser, but still persistent guilt, a voice in my head that not-so-gently goes to sleep and wakes up with me. It whispers that I have TWO jobs – the one that pays the rent and the fiscally thankless one of trying to build my own brand (whatever that means) and hone my craft.

I have written before that I am the ultimate late bloomer. I didn’t stop growing until I was 21, finally put on my first big girl bra at age 25, figured out that I wanted (needed) to write at age 30 and removed my braces (and finally gained some self-esteem) at age 31. It is terribly frustrating to realize sometimes that as I round the corner toward 33, I am far from done maturing. I am, in a very real way, still trying to figure it all out. I realize I am not alone in my extended adolescence but when I recall that Jane Austen wrote Pride and Prejudice in her early 20s, I feel so….embarrassed I think is the word for which I’m looking. I can’t even imagine being someone’s mother and I remain in awe of all the career women who do it, and do it well.

What’s my point? Besides articulating the thoughts that have taken up residency in my consciousness the last fortnight, I am wondering if other writers, of both sexes, struggle with this tension between being a part of the literal working world, while still nurturing and cherishing the dream. It’s exhausting, it can be exhilarating, but is it sustainable, or does one eventually have to make a decision about which plate they will take off the stick and eat from eternally?

Farewell to the King (February 23, 2011)

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Well, I admit I was hoping for a runoff. I never liked the way Rahm Emanuel’s win in yesterday’s Chicago’s mayoral election was accepted as a foregone conclusion almost from the moment he announced his candidacy. We have spent the last 22 years voting (or not) for a virtually uncontested monarch, Richard M. Daley. To quote myself from the link above, “Mayor Daley may have done great things in terms of beautifying the landscape and attracting new business but anyone who has lived in the city for the last 22 years knows how much damage his interminable term has done: skyrocketing property taxes, unaffordable homes, runway gang crime and terrible fiscal decisions.”

Yesterday’s trip to the polls presented a chance for residents to take their city back, to peacefully foment a revolution, inspired by the examples that are quickly spreading across the Middle East. “Change” has been a political buzzword for several years now, but I am starting to wonder if the citizenry of Chicago is interested in that all. Because now we have Rahmbo. And no matter how young (relative to Daley), good looking and tough he is, is there anyone out there who really believes Rahmbo will make a clean break from The Machine politics of the Daley dynasty? If so, I have an extensive VHS collection I’d like to sell you (valuable vintage!)

I am willing to give Emanuel a chance. In some ways there is much to celebrate in accordance with his trouncing of the competition, earning 55% of the popular vote. We have our first mayor of Jewish descent. And we are spared the indignity of being led by Carol Mosley Braun, whose meager tax returns indicate a woman incapable of running a business (which, make no mistake this city is), and whose mouth suggest a woman incapable of talking sense. I invite Ms. Mosley Braun to crawl back under the pop cultural rock from whence she came.

And if I have mixed feelings about Rahm Emanuel as Chicago’s new mayor (intertwined with my reservations about Bill Daley serving as the President’s new Chief of Staff), I am unequivocally thrilled to be rid of the Daley regime. The AP succinctly contextualizes the long running relationship as follows: “It was the city’s first mayoral race in more than 60 years without an incumbent on the ballot and the first in more than two decades without Daley among the candidates. Daley and his father have led Chicago for more than 43 out of the last 56 years.”

If ever there was an argument for term limits, Daley was it. I was never a fan but I have been forced to stand by idly for two decades as the term “affordable housing” became an oxymoron. Chicago has failing schools, rampant gang activity, and for anyone who raves about all the “beautification” initiatives Daley has undertaken, I invite you to take a trip o the South Side with me. For the most part, the King and his cohorts labored under the misguided impression that the North lakefront was the whole of the city. Coincidently, the North lakefront is where you will find all of Daley’s big and rich contributors. I am sure this is merely coincidence.

No matter who was declared the victor last night, I would be happy because today is 24 hours closer to being able to give Daley and his parking meter lease the boot. And not that this has any impact on his eventual ability to govern, but Rahm is certainly an aesthetic improvement over old Dick, with his trained ballet dancer grace and sexiness.

At least Chicago received some national political attention of the positive kind, rather than the interminable corruption charges, trials and imprisonments of our state governors. I know we have wisely placed a moratorium on the death penalty, but couldn’t we waive it just this once to rid ourselves of Blago? That clown is like the shame gift that keeps on giving (unasked).

Daley? Don’t let the door hit your ass on the way out. Rahmbo? You better mean it, unlike your former boss, when you say you’re prepared to ask Chicagoans to make the “touch choices” that will bring the city back to fiscal solvency. I’ll be watching.

Don’t Trust Anyone Over 30 (February 20, 2011)

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The adorable little toddler on the right, with the precocious awareness of “serious” camera face that persists to this day, is my husband, Aditya (better known as “Adi” to his Indian mates, and “Eddie” to Western acquaintances who struggle with the unique long “a” sound of the Hindi language). The woman on the left is his fantastically beautiful mother Pratibha, who leaves no doubts as to where my spouse came by his good looks.

This week my chosen life partner turned 30 years old. Yes, this makes me an unashamed cougar (suck it Courtney Cox!). As I experienced several years ago, the switch from 20 to 30-something, which I would argue is the new age in this infantilized world where one typically leaps from child to adult, has been somewhat jarring for my husband. He’s still a young man by any definition, but there is now more hair on his back and less on his head, too many little girls call him “uncle” for his liking, and he can’t eat anything oily without spending time in the digestive penalty box. At 30, one starts to gain an awareness of their own mortality, to suspect that the peak physical days are in the past after all. Aging is real.

It turns out that Eddie’s birthday, February 17th, is also the marker of our years together as a couple. On the same day he hit the big 3-0, we celebrated five years of courtship. I label our relationship as such because even after a half decade together, and three of those as spouses, we are still working out the parameters of our union. We are from opposite sides of the globe figuratively and quite literally, with matching hot headed tempers being one of our common traits. It’s tough work but I like that we’re doing it together. I don’t know anyone else who would even want to try putting it up with me.

I used to think it pretty uncool to get older. All that hippie “don’t trust anyone over 30” rhetoric sounded like good, common sense. After age 29, it’s like adults become the magically entrenched, the sudden producers of ideology rather than the rebellious anarchists.

But I saw the secure, confident smug worn above by a two year-old, on the face of a 30 year-old man wailing away at a karaoke version of Bon Jovi’s “Living on a Prayer” last night as he celebrated his milestone birthday surrounded by friends and family. He may have morphed into a staid software engineer by day, but after five, and his own mind, he’s still a rockstar. I think I trust anyone over 30 who still dreams big.

Hunt and Peck (February 15, 2011)

Becky Sarwate1 Comment

When I think about it, there’s really no good excuse for my condition. I went through primary school in the 1980s, when American culture exploded in its contemplation of the personal computer’s applications. There was no concept of the Internet when I entered kindergarten in 1983, but I had a fair amount of exposure to the PC in those years: a glorified word processor at home, archaic computer game play with my friends (Jeopardy! The Oregon Trail!) and lessons in basic DOS as a part of grammar school curriculum.

And yet somehow, I never learned to type. Oh I am typing now, and obviously I get by. What I mean is that I am incapable of doing so the “right” way. After 25 years of loquacious communications, I have a confession to make: I am a hunt and pecker.

Mind you, and I don’t like to brag, but I am the quickest draw there is. I may look down at the keyboard whilst I produce words, but my fingers fly over the numbers and letters like a concert pianist. The only real problem to this point has been the noise. I drill the keyboard like I am in the middle of a World War II blitzkrieg, typing out a potentially life saving SOS message, but when you work around me, it quickly becomes common white noise. I have survived 21 years of formal education (including a Master’s in English Literature), 11 years in the corporate/nonprofit world and two years as a freelance writer and blogger. I can interview subjects with a phone expertly balanced between my ear and my shoulder while I type furiously.

This never bothered me before. It was one of my charming idiosyncrasies, or so I liked to believe. Anyone can type correctly. How boring.

I was completely unselfconscious about my quirk until yesterday, the first day on the job at a small publishing firm. Anyone who has checked in with me the last four months knows all about my unemployment saga, the self-flagellation I publicly engaged in over fear that I would never work with my words, that I had chosen my life’s dream rather poorly, that I was condemned to a life of thankless freelance hustling (emphasis on the “free”). Well through a mixture of networking, patience (?) and highly practiced interviewing, I finally secured a full-time web writer and editor position with a highly respected financial guru. There’s so much to learn as I remain a relative newbie to the journalism/publishing worlds, but I have finally have my shot.

I showed up Day 1 determined to impress. There are so many diverse and demanding projects into which I will eventually sink my teeth. The new boss made it clear that a three month learning curve is expected, but I will do all I can to ensure that timeline is shortened. I can’t endure feeling out of my element for that long. I was ready to be confused, overwhelmed, possibly even a little panicked. What I was not prepared for was a sharp indictment of my sub-par typing abilities.

The new boss stood over my shoulder while I formatted a press release, an experience inherently designed to create discomfort, and her words took me completely off guard: “We are going to have to do something about your typing. There are plenty of classes and online tutorials.”

Slightly stunned and embarrassed, I began to protest that my unorthodox style had served me well to this point, but I was shut down immediately with a challenge: “Well we can do a test. If you can produce 150 words per minute, I’m good.”

I politely declined and it seems therefore that I will have to learn the proper method of word processing. I am the proverbial old dog tasked to learn a new trick. I expected many, many deficiencies to show themselves in this training period and usually do a terrific job of cataloguing anticipated flaws before they can be pointed out. I do not want this stupid issue to stand between me and publishing success

No, ‘Dancing with the Stars,’ Just No! (February 12, 2011)

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Please don’t do this to me y’all. I have watched every episode of every season you have ever had. I have stuck with you through Tom Bergeron’s multiple co-host changes (and sorry ladies, none of you can ad-lib your way out of a Smart car). I have suffered through Bristol Palin and feared your casting team could go no lower than Evander Holyfield, but now you are thinking of doing this? Does my loyalty purchase no gratitude?

Rumor Mill: Brett Favre to Join ‘Dancing with the Stars?’

I knew it. I was finally lulled into the belief that I might be free of seeing this grizzled old drama queen wince his way across my TV screen. I swore that after a highly publicized episode of texting his pee pee to a female employee of the NFL, after leading the Minnesota Vikings to a horrendously disappointing season, promising once and for all to free the league of his divatude, he might take his millions and crawl into a pop cultural cave for a spell. But no, the ultimate media whore has decided instead to give ballroom dancing a whirl.

Though a loyal fan, I have never cast a vote for a contestant of this show before. However, if the rumor pans out and Favre does compete on the 12th season of the program, I will start my own robo dial campaign – for everyone but him.

Go away Brett!