Waiting for Passion: And Then It Shows Up
I have always been a passionate person. Not necessarily dramatic, but not so far off. I have written poetic writings, stories and lyrics for a very long time. I have always been moved by certain emotions, experiences, and music. I needed a place to go with this. I had something to say and so I started at an early age writing my perspectives down whether in a poem, lyrics or a story. Let me just make the point quickly that I always say “poetic writing” instead of “poem” because I find what I do to be very much like a poem, but also very different then one’s perception of what poetry is. I write more in a prose style, no rhyming (unless maybe in lyrics) and in a free form that expresses my feelings but in a more vivid use of words. I have found many people who do not really read poetry to think that poetry is a framed writing about leaves in winter or an examination of something they have no idea of what the author is talking about. They were only exposed to poetry maybe in English Lit. and know Robert Frost or Longfellow and did not get it at all. I guess who cares at that point then. They won’t be interested anyway. I love poetic writings that are different than what we were shown growing up. That is why I love ee cummings. I read some of his collection in an aisle of my library my senior year and was blown away. Wow! Who was this guy? He wrote of sexuality and had a bump and flow like nothing I had ever read. He was so progressive. Anyway, I am getting off topic. If you think you do not like poetry, check him out.
Back to me. So, after I went to university at UT at Austin, I graduated with a degree in Psychology. It totally fits me. However, the job path went awry. I was hired and trained to be a buyer. I was in a very grey world of technology and was buying parts for machines to be built. Great experience and good money but these things led me in a different direction of me, who I now know at the core is a creative. It was fine. I was making money and playing with friends and partying after work so my life was good. When you have one job, to get another you must play off of what you have done before. So off I went, job after job of buying for different companies. Not until a few years ago when this industry started spitting out who they had brought in, did I realize that I was playing hard at a game that did not define me. While I had enjoyed my jobs, they were in no way a definition of who I was at all. Crisis. I launched into a grueling introspection of what made me up. I floundered and struggled to help myself arrive at some conclusion. It never came. What would happen when I did anyway? Would I go back to school? Would I start over as a newbie at some low level position of something that would interest me? That sucks. So I continued to try to explore what may interest me. What is my passion? Nothing would stand up and take responsibility. Or I had so many interests but none more than another. This led only to indecision and despair.
Maybe, if I had been making great money and the industry had allowed me stay at one place long enough to excel, I would not have arrived here…just yet. However, with constant lay offs, companies closing and companies only hiring temps for a year…I was thrust into the reality that I could no longer make a career at. I wondered if I was A.D.D.. I really did. I would be excited about a new direction and then a week later be very blasé at the notion. There was no drive in any new way. I admired people who knew what they wanted and just went for it. I knew I was passionate…so I knew that I would know when the right thing when it would slap me in the face. Nothing was reaching out to whack me. Only myself, in anger and frustration. Ugh, I was almost drowning in the indecision and confusion of what to do next. I hated where I was working and was being treated in a way that was below my standards and pride. I was embarrassed. To be treated in such a manner, so undervalued and paid so little…it sucked! It forced me to keep looking and to beat myself up for a conclusion. It was awful. We can be so unforgiving to ourselves. I know that this is the mind pushing us to take the next step. What was it, damn it!?
One Sunday morning, Kevin and I are sitting on the couch watching the discovery channel. He is on his laptop at the same time, a favorite activity at any place or time. It is fun to look shit up and watch TLC or the discovery channel on Sundays. It’s what we do. So he tells me about the travel channel’s bootcamp on video/film held overseas. It sounds interesting. Maybe not so interesting at $5,000 a person, but intriguing nonetheless. So I try on the idea as I do any new idea posing a new career/life. Hmm, I like what it conjures up. Filming interviews, documentaries or whatever you want as a way of life, a way of career. It also has the cool factor to it. “Yes, I do documentaries or I make videos”…um, yes, that is cool! I play with this idea for the next couple of weeks. It buzzes in me and talks to me like it knows what I want to hear. It stays with me like nothing else has in years. What is happening here? Am I crazy?
I get out of the car one morning to head into my office building and I am feeling dread. After a few emotional traumas in the past year, I am worn out. I am feeling depressed. I felt like nothing could be quite good. It frightened me. I went to work. Feeling fragile, I open email. I immediately start looking at film schools and classes. I email my husband, showing him what I had found. He emails back that he has gotten his company and me into an intro video/film course two weeks away! I email back, ”What??!!” He confirms his original message. My little creative soul soars and flies around my desk. My heaviness from before starts to leak out and is replaced by hope for the future. God bless that man, protector of my confused mind and deliverer of my new direction!
It has been happy days since. I am still at my job but making plans to embark on a new exciting adventure. My ideas are endless and my mind is saying that I am on the right track. Passion has reared its gorgeous head. We will see where this will go but I am more sure about this than I have been about anything in years!
So let me tell you people, if you are questioning…keep beating yourself up until you get some answers. I feel so refreshed and relieved. Look for what naturally motivates you. Look for what you can put “you” into. Stay tuned! I am hoping for great things to come.
Losing Something Precious
I know from experience that not everyone feels attachment to their animals in a strong indescribable way like others do. I am an animal lover and feel very strongly about my relationships with all of them. They are my babies. Truly. My Tabby cat, Wolfie, has been with me 15 years. He was my first babe that I got when I lived in a co-op during college. He has known me and my husband from the very start of our relationship. He was my first cat ever. We had always had dogs, Westies, in my family growing up. As in any long relationship, I know his expressions and behavioral nuances. I know what that deep stare from across the room means. It may be just a raise of an eyebrow but I know the difference between his saying I don’t feel well than the stare of I am mad at you for leaving me all day. I also know that at first he did not approve when we brought home a wily shih tzu from the pound. Greta was the dog that looked like Grover as she sat inside the cage at the Town Lake Shelter. Paint in her hair and mats all over her body from the home she had just been abandoned from. They told the shelter that it cost too much to feed her. This little 9 month old puppy was terrified and abused. As soon as we let her off the leash, she ran over to Kevin and sat in his lap. She was not tempted to run around the yard, she wanted to sit in his lap. He looked up at me and said, “Oh” in such a way I knew our search was over. I was hesitant.
Greta and I immediately started bonding on trips to go see Kevin, who lived an hour and a half away at the time. She slowly started making her way onto my lap as I drove. Finally, I allowed it. She curled up satisfied and I could not resist this strange little dog. We started to know each other. With little nods, face rubs and intimate spooning in my bed at night…she stole my heart completely. After years, we just knew each other so well. If I was unhappy, she knew. She would stop playing or wandering in the yard to come and sit on my lap or kiss my face. She knew her mama. This bond grew more and more over the 14 years we were together.
I would not feel quite content until I had walked through the door, seen her and greeted her. I wrote songs to her about my fear of one day being without her. From the time she turned ten, I worried about losing her. Kevin worried that I would not do well when that time came and even mentioned that maybe I would need counseling to prepare. I knew when that time came, it would not go well. Greta and Wolfie had been with us from the beginning. It would be an end of an era. A life I would not want to know. That day came. I felt a kind of primitive grief I had never known. My body shrieked with inconsolable sadness and despair. I was even taken aback at the immense sadness.
Ok, sorry to drag you into the depths of this story. The point is, if you have lost someone, you will understand. I turned to music as therapy like I always did. “How Can I Tell You” by Cat Stevens was our song. A great song that says it all and helps one through the hardest times. I searched for many but this one helps the most. I think of her always and this song is the lullaby that soothes and sings out to my baby. Check it out.
Life, Love and Happiness
written in 2007
Do you ever feel sometimes that you are marked? This year has been brutal. I have had four major losses and wonder when life is going to let me breathe. I wonder if anyone else feels like that. Don’t get me wrong. I have been blessed. I really have. I have an amazing family and I was lucky enough to find an out-of-this-world love at an early age. So I do not take these things for granted. Not in the least. But life has really shown itself to be a struggle in the last 7 years or more.
Life is bittersweet. That is what I have said, but now I am really living it. You seem to get the idea, growing up, that life has a certain path and anything is possible. You know that if you follow your dreams and do what everyone else has done then you will be happy. It seemed so simple then. You were young and full of confidence and cockiness. I think I felt this way until my later 20’s. This is when I started learning life’s harder lessons.
I was angry at life and bitter. But then we moved on with hope and happiness after every hardship. That is how we are. We have each other and we always find a way to be happy and find our next goal in life. I know, now, that there are no promises in life. You have to carve out your happiness. You have to create those great times. The hard ones will come on their own. I guess this makes life all the more richer. I am thankful for love. Love of family, love of my husband, love of my animals. The connection with people and those emotions are everything in this life. Know that.
I am here to talk about what I see and experience. This is a recount of the amazing times and the truly hard times. It is all worth it. However, finding that there are not necessarily any balances in place in life…it is truly an unknown journey. I am constantly recalculating the ways that I can find to cope with the struggles as I push my way to all of the joy that is there to be relished. I want my life to be grand. I want to not be overwhelmed by the setbacks. This is my pursuit of life, love and happiness.
Dear God- a song to check out
Oh my, I am going down a memory lane. There are many but this one is particularly great. XTC’s “Dear God”. Man, when I first heard this song I was so moved. Questioning religion, this song was thrilling to me. I was raised a good Catholic girl. I attended Our Lady Of Mount Carmel in Virginia. I was there long enough to be brainwashed to some extent. My sisters were 4 and 5 years older than me. Enough of a difference in ages to be worlds apart. They were dating boys and I was being schooled in all that was sinful. I caught my sister making out one day with her boyfriend and I told her she was going to hell. I really did. Crazy. Three years in that school taught me well and that most things were evil. It freaked my sisters out. Afterward, it freaked me out. One year out of that place had me sneaking out in England, where we lived for my eighth grade year, to drink beer and flirt with boys. Some things just do not take.
What rocked my world was when my mom said to me one day in 9th grade, that she believed the bible was a gathering of stories to live by, not necessarily the truth or history. I was amazed. Raised to believe that the bible was factual, I was sent reeling. I had so many questions in Catholic school that our teacher, a nun, got frustrated with me and sent me to the priests to discuss my inquiries. There I happened to get Father Norbert. He was an aging priest who patiently listened to my doubts about God. His words have always stayed with me. I was lucky to have found him. He said God is whatever and whoever created us. No BS about the man with the beard in the sky. Whatever and whoever created us? That meant we are here by something that made us. I could not deny that. Something did create us. Big bang? Random evolution? I could buy into “whatever or whoever”. Father Norbert was the first to open my eyes to accepting that we do not know anything really but we are still amazed.
I went to college in Tx from my little school in Germany and met a friend who exposed me to this song. I was blown away. The song said it exactly. I may not believe in you and these stories but I wear my heart on my sleeve, just in case. Moving. Powerful. Check it out.
Personal On-Hold Music
I am sure you guys have noticed this before but it continues to amuse me. “Personal on-hold music”. If you have any reason to be on the phone a good deal, you will have experienced this. I am a buyer and have to call suppliers and clients all day long. Anytime someone on the phone has to reference their computer, look something up in a file or take a second out from the conversation, they hum or doot-de-doot a kind of personal on-hold song. I do it too. It fills the silence. It lets the listener know that you are active, maybe waiting for results, but not in the conversation. What the hell is this phenomenon? Almost all people do this.
Once you notice it, it is quite entertaining to listen to what rendition of the “personal on-hold music” a person will make. Humans just can not stand to have an awkward silence. We do not hum a bar of a familiar tune. No, instead, our brain activates the creation of an, on-the-fly, little diddy that is totally unique to that individual. It is pretty hilarious once you start taking notice. What music do you make?
Resume Snippet
8+ years in Purchasing, Planning and Project Management in the semiconductor, electronics, chemical/aerospace, software, and client service industries. Over a decade of exposure to Business and Marketing from my life with an entrepreneur with direct involvement in strategy and campaigns. Certified in Landing Page Optimization and am moving toward gaining more Internet Marketing experience. Hands-on professional accustomed to fast paced environment and known for exceptional ability with progressive, challenging assignments. Exceptional relationship builder with ability to create instant rapport and long lasting connections with coworkers and clients.
Yes, that is the sound byte to my resume if I had sound. That gives you my experience in my career but I am much more than the words on my resume. It is hard to really sum up a person in just job titles but such is the way of the world. And lucky us, we have the wonderful world of blogs to help us overcome these restrictions.
I grew up moving all over the world with my family. My father was a fighter pilot in the Air Force and we were lucky to have the great life of seeing the world and being exposed to other cultures. It gets in your blood and you will always crave the dazzling experiences of meeting new people and eating foods of foreign lands. Thanks, Dad. We spent a great deal of time in Germany and it is now a second home to us.
I traveled a great distance to Texas to arrive on the campus of The University of Texas at Austin. Austin, now my hometown. I have a degree in psychology which really does reflect a great deal about my personality. I am curious about human behavior and why things are the way they are. My husband calls me Wonderwoman because I always start sentences with ” I wonder why…”.
I am on a journey to my next position with an interesting and creative company. I am gathering up my experience and talent and launching myself to my next adventure. Wish me luck.
The Thing That Makes My Heart Beat Faster
If you know me at all, you know that music is one of the big loves of my life. I know many people love music but then, even more so, there are people who live and breathe through music. I know these people when I meet them and quite often if we have more than one occasion to hang out, we are drawn to each other in this understanding. Like addicts at a secret meeting, we want to share our intense desire and compare notes. Might we share common interests in this? Can I trust you and your tastes after our initial interviews to give me constant recommendations? “Oh my god, try this… it is good, right?” “I got more where that comes from.” “When you find something that thrills you, email me so I can listen.”
I know when I like something I am listening to. I have this tendency to stop breathing. It is a strange effect but I find myself holding my breath almost to hear the sound more, to get closer to the notes, to the beats, to the words. If you love music, you know what I mean.
I thought everyone was like this until I started meeting people who, when they say, “oh I like everything”, really means that nothing particular stands out to them or they just love music that they can dance to with their girlfriends at a club. (shoes off, pantyhosed feet and purses piled in the middle). “Oh my god, this is so awesome”. Ooh, I just did it. I sounded like the music snob. I am really not. Well, not as much as some people are. I actually have a great appreciation for many kinds of music. I have a majority that falls into certain genres like the ever generic term of alternative and indie, but some Spanish influenced music like the Gipsy Kings can leave me dizzy from holding my breath. Or some Big Band sounds from the 30’s and 40’s find me dancing around the kitchen, dreaming of what must have been more pure times. It reminds me of a time that has been created in my mind but not ever experienced. That is ok; it is as real as if I had been in those dance halls or in a smoky little club listening to Ella croon. Or you may even catch me pounding the steering wheel to the Spanish, rap, rock sounds of Ozomatli. I love NIN, Sinead, Band of Horses, Damien Rice, The Smiths, The Dismemberment Plan, Modest Mouse and on and on. Bottom line: if it has passion and emotion that rings true to me, bring it on. I respect it and I respect what moves you. Try me, I may love it or I may make a mental note that you and I probably will not be swapping recommendations in the future.
Music is absolute therapy. I have this funny jukebox in my mind. I was unaware of it until one day I realized what I was doing. I may be feeling something and all of a sudden I would be singing a song that expressed what I was feeling. This was an unconscious action. Sometimes I would not even know what I was feeling and then I would be singing some random song from my childhood, maybe a song my Dad would play. Maybe some Rod Stewart song or even Anne Murray would play and, upon analysis, I would realize the words described what I was feeling. I would not try to think of a song, it would just come out without any will to conjure it up. I was amazed. My mind was keeping track of lyrics and matching them up with my emotions. What the hell? I think it is the craziest thing and a special thing to me. Now I pay attention when I come out with some random Willie, Air Supply or Depeche Mode song. I start listening to the lyrics and sure enough it fits the mood. I have to watch that I am not too loud or I get the puzzled look and the inevitable question, why are you singing “Elvira” or, are you humming “Let’s Get Physical”?
So ok, you get it. I love love love music. I want to share and learn. What I would like to do is to start giving recommendations of music that I love from the past and now. No boundaries or rules on genre. I would really love to hear yours too. Truly. What makes you hold your breath?
What To Do With All Of This Goodness? ( when you are an indecisive pansy})
So, I have always done well in school, sung all my life, write well and have done this in prose, marketing pieces and music lyrics. I am a real natural at creating bonds and building relationships. I am the one you awkwardly start to talk to at a party or a business meeting and suddenly will be laughing with and swapping business cards. My friends affectionately call me “The Interrogator” because I really love to know about you and will know more about you at the end of out time together than most. Maybe it is the same thing that drew me to a psychology degree in University. I love human behavior and to know what makes people love what they love and what makes them dislike what they dislike. I like to know what has made up an individual and what drives them in their personal life and their business world. Sound scary? Don’t worry, you won’t feel a thing and you will actually enjoy our time together. This natural curiosity has served me well as it ends up creating an instant rapport. There is nothing false about it. I swear. I like being able to get to know other people, at least the ones open to sharing and learning about others. I do run across the people who give you the shut down. That is ok…either they are not worth it or they will come around eventually. I am not tooting my own horn here. I just really can read people and love finding a connection, whether it be in a short elevator conversation with a stranger or working with coworkers and customers.
I also have a great deal of working experience as a buyer, project manager and an exposure to in-depth knowledge of business and marketing. My brilliant husband has always been the ultimate entrepreneur since we met at the tender age of me at 18 and him at 21. He always had ideas and would predict new trends in business. He never saw anything as an obstacle. I had never been exposed to that. Business and Marketing are his loves, his hobbies and his job. I have always envied him loving something that was a career as well. He keeps files and files of research on new interests and old. He teaches himself all the new web applications and always has his finger on the pulse of internet marketing and connectedness through the web. How cool is that?
So what I am meaning to tell you is, that through this journey with him, as you can imagine, our conversations are heavily about business and marketing. I have been a part of many business strategy and marketing planning sessions. We are always analyzing target markets and possible campaigns for whatever he is working on. We both worked for a start up in the late 90’s where his CEO/business partner asked me to leave my job and join them. The CEO was impressed with my accumulated knowledge of business and marketing. He wanted me to come on as a catch all. I could do purchasing, hiring, representation of the company for Venture Capital presentations, client building and the liaison for the web content/site creation. So my job as wife to an entrepreneur and marketing genius has given me my own private education. I only hope to be able to express that into real experience in whatever my next step is.
So here lies the problem. When I got out of school with a psych degree, no one wanted me with just an undergrad degree. Most jobs out there wanted someone who could type fast. My hopes started to dwindle. My first job out of school was Applied Materials. They wanted me! They wanted to pay me well. They wanted to train me to be a planner/buyer. A happy time in my life. I was making money, I was young and I did not have to do homework anymore. Sign me up! Well, from one job to the next building my experience as a pro in purchasing was great until I realized that the Tech industry was a cruel mistress. She wanted you and then she wanted to lay you off. Repeatedly. It was hard to keep excelling when companies were closing or when Tech companies were only offering 1 year contracts. My husband begged me to get out of high tech due to the instability. The career I was building was not building anymore because of all of this. Hey wait no fair!
So I found a company that promised to be the mentor I had always dreamed of and push me to great international heights. I became a buyer for international clients and well known domestic aerospace clients. I took a pay cut for the experience it promised and let us not forget, the stability. Glory, Glory.
Soon things revealed themselves as not what was promised. The manager that promised me mentoring and riches left and a new management came in. I will be honest as I am told not to be. Etiquette here says to be PC talking about employers. The whole place changed and finding employees for the lowest dollar was key. Raises were almost non existent. The realization set in that not only had I taken a lower salary for this but that there was nowhere left to go.
I started seeing this as an opportunity to really analyze what I might want to do next. Purchasing was not what made me up or defined me but had left me with great experience. My talent at writing, working and building relationships could translate. What is next? Ah, indecision settled down on me like a nesting mother bird. Would other companies see my potential in a new position that was not purchasing?
I became very interested in Internet Marketing and companies that were building communities and reaching out to clients to help foster business in this way. I already knew a great deal from my internship to my husband’s many marketing/business endeavors. I had a knack for it, combined with my ability in the psychology of human behavior and relationships. I took an 8 week certification course on Landing Page Optimization. I took to it right away, learning the formulas for successful sites. I aced the certification exam. I was empowered. Would this be enough?
So my struggle now is to stay in the right mindset, ignore indecision of what to do next ,just jump, and prove that all of this experience adds up to an excellent find for any company. Market myself. Show all of this goodness and shed the indecisive pansy. I am ready to take the leap and whoever catches me will be amazed at what I can bring to the table.
Workplace Psychosis
Workplace Psychosis
So it has been no secret that I have been in a rut. Mentally strangling myself everyday to come up with what the next steps could be for me job wise and life wise. I have been given talent and at the same time have a huge helping of indecision. Many things interest me and I am quite skilled, but what does mama want to do? I guess I always thought it would be clear and when it wasn’t, I just knew that that really cool person, who has the greatest company and a bad-ass attitude, would meet me in a coffee shop and know I was for them. They would embarrass themselves by telling me how unique I was and how I must come work for them. They would wax on about the grooviest position and ask me if a gazillion dollars would woo me away from my mediocre position. Smiling coyly, I would say something sarcastic.They would shoot coffee out of their nose and we would remember that day that we met forever. And we would share it with all of our bad-ass coworkers in the future. Well, I am on my 1,232 cup of coffee and this cup is cold. They ain’t showing up, are they?
So, flash to me in my cube. I am drilling away, watching the clock, trying to meet tough metrics and a ladybug scares the shit out of me. Of all the things to make a girl shriek like she just caught her thong in the wrong spot. A ladybug flew off of me onto my keyboard. Holy spotted insect! He sat on the key of D. I tried to get him and accidentally pushed him between D and E. Yikes! I carefully maneuver him out with a pen, certain that I see legs coming off. Crap! I did not want the all familiar case of trying to save something living only to become their demise.
I cooed and whispered, “You do not belong in a place like this.” Suddenly it hit me…this beautiful creature was me. You do not belong in a place like this! I was crazed by the analogy. I had to save myself, I mean ladybug. Grabbing paper, I willed the legless ladybug to get on. Hopefully he was just coiled in a safety position. Did he, too, check his soul at the door as he entered the office, flying past the in/out board? Oh man, he IS me… I get him on the paper and he moves slightly. Yes! I quickly grab a Styrofoam 6 oz cup ( a sweet free perk of my job which we are often reminded not to take for granted. Much like the free salt and pepper packets that abound in the fancy breakroom). I toss Ladybug in. Nice and safe. I do a quick check and to my horror he is drowning in the residual water left in the cup. I pour him out on my desk and blow. He raises an arm for me to stop or maybe for me to take his hand. He crawls on my arm… We’re outta here. I race down the aisle, people popping up like prairie dogs in their wall-less offices to see my rescue attempt. I throw the cup down in a fury as I pass through the waiting room and catch the elevator. I raise my arm and he scurries down. I put my arm down and he races up. I am caught in some freakish Hitler dance as I become more committed in these final moments to save me, and ladybug. On the first floor, I rush out through the doors and out into the sunshine…he takes flight.
“Fly away from here!” I shout as the leafblowers stop and stare. “Fly away!”
Success. Phew. I walk back inside, laughing from the exhilaration. Alone, I start to ponder what the hell just happened. As I get in the elevator, I realize I had just endured a mini breakdown. I just identified with a trapped ladybug. I just raced to save his little existence from my daily life.
I knew, now, more than ever before that I needed to get off my ass and find my next step. I was so worried about Ladybug getting stuck in my environment. But what about me? Ain’t no one rushing to sweep me off my feet. Ain’t nobody waiting for me in that coffee shop. I need to put that effort into saving myself. I am caught between the keys of D and E and I need to learn how to freakin fly and not to drown in any Styrofoam cups…even if they are free, damn it. I had been in denial until that little Ladybug delivered his message, “YOU DO NOT BELONG IN A PLACE LIKE THIS”.
