Chepooka

Where I lose my shit

My day started early for a Saturday morning. I caught up on some client work, launched a site (yay, I love that), teased my in-box a bit, sent out the April billing. Then argued with a client about a balance due from last October. Then greeted said client who unexpectedly appeared at my door, me in my pajamas (well, pj pants and my favorite t-shirt from a road trip to Dartmouth in 1992 that is soft and wonderful but so, so, so tattered and worn) to review photocopies of cleared checks. Oh and I had no bra on, so I kept my arms crossed over the girls for 25 minutes good times. I’m an asshole.

Realized I made a huge human error in my memory and ledger. Had a total mental breakdown. Then I organized my office a bit.

I must back up because yes, I said mental breakdown. Surreal; not in a good way.

I guess I was all of a sudden overwhelmed with this self-employment thing. I’m entering my fifth year now. Four years of ups and downs. Ups. Downs. And for who knows why, I’m still here. I gotta tell you, some days I just don’t like it. And I want to tell my boss to shove it.

I am quite certain that if I went to work for somebody else, I would make more money, work less, and have more of a life. I do question why I bother sometimes, and especially days like today. Where three hours on a Saturday morning is spent auditing my books so I can track down a $300 discrepency from October. From my apartment. That I rent. At age 36. Across the street from a house for sale, a 1300 square foot fixer-upper built in the 1940s listed at $699,000. That I’d love to buy and fix up. But I am just not there yet. Will I ever be? Maybe another life. Maybe I should have gone to law school or become a real estate agent.

I started crying. Not really sure why, it isn’t like a blow I gasket about $300. Sure I am a super emotional person and I cry, I do. I get frustrated, I take life too seriously, blah blah blah. But I work hard to be a pretty composed person, to stay positive. Fuck. It just doesn’t always work. And I hate that. I hate showing weakness, I hate losing my shit, I hate letting things get the better of me, I hate that I can’t control the need to express my emotions sometimes. It’s mortifying, it’s frustrating. I’m writing about it now, and while it feels great—it also feels self-indulgent, whiny and pathetic. And I hate that, too.

I didn’t cry because I made a stupid mistake, we all make them. I didn’t cry because I have to work on a Saturday, we all do what we need to do. I didn’t cry because I’m frustrated with the economy and the housing market, in all I’ve invested to make a life for myself but it’s never quite enough. We all know what that feels like. I still have no idea why this loud sob of frustration just came out of me. What was that?

My client is also self-employed, and considering she dropped in totally unannounced and unexpected-like and in the middle of said breakdown, I found it hard to suck it in and control it. As I was talking with her, I apologized for ruining her Saturday morning, and fuck fuck fuck the tears just started forming and I had to fight to keep them in but just ... couldn’t. She saw it, despite my efforts to be non-crazy-emotional-girl, and I could see a little liquid glimmer in her eyes too. Strange thing then happened, she hugged me. And then spent the next 15 minutes pouring out her frustrations and struggles with her own business, and talked about how it’s so hard keeping your shit together sometimes. The only cure is to not be self-employed. There are no options for us, and if you’re self-employed or ever have been you probably know, you have no choice—you must handle the bad stuff even when you would rather be enjoying your Saturday like everybody else. You can’t call in sick or ask for a department transfer, you have no HR department to file a grievance. You just have to.

After that I wrapped things up and went out and enjoyed my day a bit—got some posters framed (photos coming soon!), went to visit my family, got some air, played some x-box, took a nap.

Now I’m sitting here on a Saturday night full of energy from my nap, choosing to sit in my office for some reason. I like it in here, it’s a cozy little haven I’ve made for myself—so comfortable. It should be—it’s where I spent 80% of my life. My new posters on the wall (my favorite is the Big Head Todd new year’s eve autographed concert poster that spent five months in a cardboard tube), my television on the movie channel, a bottle of pinot noir open on my desk. I do love my job, I do. And that’s not just the pinot talking.

For some reason, not sure why, this leads me to the topic of blogging. Maybe because I feel generally inadequate today and don’t want to bother you with two separate posts about that.

I visited some blogs tonight that I just love, written by bloggers that are funny, entertaining, interesting ... I just felt another fuck fuck fuck! I love blogging, the whole idea of blogging; bloggers; blogs; and blogginess. I love it. But these last six months I’ve put a huge effort into not being at my computer so much. And that meant giving up some stuff that I really enjoy—writing regularly, reading blogs, connecting with my friends and finding new and fascinating people out there in the blogosphere. I have four blogs, and I’ve neglected them all terribly. For no other reason than just needing more balance. Or maybe this is my life, and I just need to find balance within these four walls of my office, I don’t know. It’s never enough. Time in the day. Motivation. Inspiration.

Some time ago, I was approached by an author (in the web world, she’s a *somebody* and old-school style; I remember her from a web conference I went to in ‘99)—she’s featuring one of my blogs (not this one, chepooka is under-the-radar just like I like it) and sent me an email today asking for some participation in helping create a buzz about the book. I have not devoted time to these blogs in months, and I feel so bad. So bad. So bad. Guilty, inadequate, fuck fuck fuck.

Maybe there is something wrong with me. Or maybe that’s just how blogging is. Which is what I’m trying to figure out tonight. I revisited some of my very favorite bloggers that I met in 2004 when I first got chepooka going. Some are kicking ass, with 100 comments for each and every word they utter in each and every post. Some are hanging in there. Many of them are gone. It may not seem like it, but I’m still here. Inadequate, but here.

I admire people that can fill their days up with so much stuff, but I don’t think I’ll ever be one of them. I am ambitious, and hard-working—yet lazy? Damn I like my couch time. I could do better, I could do more, I could be more . Or something, I don’t know. Tell me why I can’t get more accomplished in this life, or even if I should or need to. Please?