Model Example?

This morning I read an article posted by a woman who clearly has a very strong and negative opinion about getting the Victoria’s Secret swimsuit catalog*. The post was filled with images from the catalog and she tossed out numerous jabs at both the clothes and the women wearing them. After a couple paragraphs I started wondering the following:

Why is it okay for average Janes like us to say that models are too skinny, too tan, too sexy looking in their photographs but the moment someone comments on our weight, our skin tone, our facial expressions we get all up in their face like they just called the Pope an Atheist?

I can say with 100% certainly this statement is true – models are people with feelings and just as much ability to have them hurt by words tossed in their direction because the people who say them seem to think their life and career choices are somehow superior.

Let me say right now that I’m not jealous of supermodels, Victoria’s Secret models, catalogue models or models in general. In fact, I might even respect them more because I don’t have that talent. I take horrible pictures most of the time and I accept that. What I lack in visual appeal I make up for with my glorious, witty personality.

Or something like that.

Anyway, I’m not a model and I don’t know any models but I feel it’s my duty as a woman to put this out there as a rebuttal to the common misconceptions many people have about models: 

• Just because a woman is skinny doesn’t mean she doesn’t eat.
• Just because a photo appears in a magazine doesn’t mean it started out looking exactly how the finished product appears.
• Just because a woman is beautiful, sexy, can wear tiny little clothes and sell those clothes because of her look, it doesn’t mean she should be open to public ridicule for doing her job.

Sure there might be some models who have eating disorders or other issues but it isn’t just models who face these problems. Lawyers, school principals, stay at home moms could have the same body/food issues but no one seems to harass those people about their weaknesses in public.

I really started wondering why the public seems to think it’s alright to scorn someone else for having something they don’t have – money, love, a rockin’ body, sex appeal. Is it jealousy?

For me, the real issue is that I’m disappointed in myself for not getting off my lazy ass and working out, for not eating healthy enough to still have the tiny frame I used to have. My feelings and my body image have nothing to do with the woman who has somehow managed to find the time to do all that stuff.

It’s not her fault I’m overweight. It’s not her fault I have cellulite and it’s not her fault I can’t rock the swimsuit that she can (yet). It’s my fault.

Yup, I said it and I stand by my choice.

Bear in mind, I don’t harbor delusions of body where I think that if I work out all the time and stop eating I’ll suddenly grow 6+ inches in height and lose every curve or varicose vein on my body. Come on now, I’m not young and stupid (anymore). But if I stopped being lazy and started taking better care of myself I actually could rock this bathing suit:

Yes she’s beautiful, yes she sells sex through her eyes and body, and yes the scene around her is picturesque.

Now, here’s some other things to think about when you look at that picture:

► Most swimsuit photo shoots happen in winter. Yup. This woman is probably freezing her tight, tan ass off but do you see that in her face? No. Models have to rise above being totally uncomfortable in order to do their fucking job. And that ain’t easy.

► What if she’s got the flu but scheduled for a photo shoot they’re paying for her to be a part of? You think she gets a sick day? Uh, no not so much. At least, not if she wants to pay her mortgage.

► What if the only time they could book for a shoot is on her kid’s 5^th birthday? You think they’ll reschedule because she ordered up a bouncy castle? Try again.

► The chances that this woman just got 2 hours of sleep on a plane, spent 8 hours “frolicking” in ice cold water then got right back on a plane to travel 10 hours for another shoot where she has to be professional and upbeat (aka not cranky and tired) is pretty high. How much of a toll might that kind of schedule take on someone’s body?

► Speaking of body, models contort into positions no human should be able to pull off so you can see as much of the product as possible. Seriously, I dare you to get in front of a full-length mirror and try to get your body into the position in this photo. Then stay there for 4-8 hours with little time for a break.

► Oh, and don’t forget your face because getting in that position for that long is painful and you can’t let that show on your face or your photos will suck and you won’t get paid to do your job.

► Then, while you’re doing all that other stuff, don’t forget your light source must hit the right places on your face or again you’re going to look kind of weird.

► And weirdness might sell some stuff – see tortoise framed glasses, hipster music, books – but it doesn’t sell swimsuits. Sexy sells swimsuits.

So here’s my big overarching question:

As women, shouldn’t we be embracing of WHATEVER other women want to do for a living (you know, as long as it’s legal)? Are we seriously persecuting each other for being too sexy now? How fucked up of a female double-standard is that?

If I met whoever that gal is in the picture up there I’d give her a high five and thank her for taking care of herself. I’d thank her for getting her ass off her sofa, going out and using the thing she has to her best advantage to make a career for herself.

Remember how women used to not be able to do that? This woman should get a medal for doing what she loves AND getting paid for it.

And I’d thank her for pushing me to go that extra half mile on my stationary bike. Because, while I have ZERO delusions that I’d ever have the same body type or shape she has, I use the image as inspiration to better myself.

It’s hard enough for women out there so I see no reason for other women to shit all over each other just because we make choices to make the most of the gifts, skills and talents we have. Regardless of what those gifts, skills or talents happen to be.

Now, if you’ll excuse me I need to get back on my stationary bike to do my 5 miles this morning because I’m going to get back in shape for me so I can buy that bathing suit and love how I look in it.

Non-model flaws and all.

Image courtesy Victoria’s Secret

*Sorry I can’t seem to locate the link to this story. If you read it please feel free to share the link in the comments.

A new window opens when you click to comment. Also, I get lots of spam comments so if the post is older than 3 days, your comment will be moderated.

Is There No Such Thing As Quality Anymore?

Sometimes it’s really, really hard to be a Writer. Mostly because I notice the spelling and grammar mistakes in every piece of printed anything now.  And no, I don’t like being a hypocrite, because I’m sure my blog is rife with grammatical liberties, but when your spelling mistake is emblazoned across something that ends up in the hands of tens of thousands of people I’m forced to ask how it got through the cracks.

I’m also forced to consider whether anyone has told you about your mistake.  If not is it because the general public feels too shy to bring up these types of things, or is it because no one noticed until now?  If it’s the latter then I feel it is my duty to pray for this country’s future.  Because it is most certainly headed to a hell where hell is spelled with an e on the end.

When I tell you what it was that I caught (on the first read, at 7:00 in the morning, before coffee mind you) you might laugh and shrug your shoulders wondering why I made such a big deal about it in the first place.  Then again, since I know most of you are like me, you’re probably already sending me an email to find out what the company is so you can alert their marketing department of their huge gaffe.

So as you know we closed with mortgage company one.  We’ll just call them American Slacker Mortgage (or ASM for short).  ASM was probably the most frustrating company on the planet to work with and our deal actually caused multiple people to place them on a black list.  Our broker considered leaving the industry as a whole.  I was counting down the days until we could refinance out of the loan and into a better company who gave a crap about their clients.

(READ: live in the fantasy world inside my head where rainbows shoot out of a unicorn’s ass and we all skip along holding hands, singing the Smurfs theme music with a big smile on our face all the live-long day.  Then everyone pats me on the forehead because of my forced naiveté that everything is sunshine and roses…)

Anyway, about a week ago we received the letter almost everyone gets these days - that our loan was sold.  I was doing the happy dance because it would save me the trouble of refinancing in a couple years.  The new company sounded promising, they were closer to our side of the country so our checks would undoubtedly arrive faster and though I’d never heard of them before I was assured it would all work out A-OK.  For simplicity let’s just call them Our New Bank, or ONB.

We started getting mail at the new house in the past couple days (wahoo!) and yesterday we received the first statement from ONB.  The first of the next, proposed, 360 months of my life.  I opened my statement this morning.  On the return envelope there was one of those tear-off thingies under the flap.  Most of the time those are there to fill out for a change of address or similar.  This one was there to request setting up automatic payment deduction.

I was slightly intrigued (READ: anytime I can be lazy and not have to think about things like paying bills if it can happen automatically then I’m all for it).  So I sat in front of my monitor and read the request.  And then there it was.

When I see spelling mistakes I consider a couple things.  First, is the letter that’s out of place next to a letter that should have been used and was hit in simultaneous error?  Second, is the letter in question next to the space bar and was hit accidentally?

Where this spelling mistake is concerned, the answer in both cases my friends, is a resounding no.  So here’s what I received.

I counted and there are 123 words in the little two paragraph blurb.  One hundred and twenty-three words and a spelling mistake like that slips through?  Especially when word 37 is the same word and spelled correctly!

That’s it, I’ve had it with the utter lack of attention to detail in this world.  The sheer volume of laziness on this planet is astounding to me.  Like I said, I crave laziness as well but not when it comes to stuff like this.  If I released my book including a spelling error within every 123 words there would be approximately 512 spelling mistakes in my manuscript.  Who cares so little they allow something like that?

The sad truth is that the answer to the question is most people.  But how could I trust they’d even get my information correct when entering into their computer?  If they can make a mistake like that on the request for my information, right there in my face in bold purple ink, can I really have confidence in the abilities of the company as a whole?  And as much as it pains me to say it, even with all the lack of caring by ASM at least they spelled everything correctly.

Sigh.

Guess I hold companies to a much higher standard than I should.

Eache and every one of them.

Philosophical and Financial Run Around

Brain has to recharge.  Can’t get clear.

Things I’m pondering with no real answers right now:

Continuing the degree.  My school is being unreasonable and though not actually coming out & saying they’re refusing to send me an itemized bill, I’ve asked for one seven times now and still have nothing.  They just keep referring me to the online finances tab but that’s where the confusion has come from to begin with.  They say I owe $834, the financial current due reads $151.  Most recently I was told that, since I didn’t have a payment schedule set up on my finance page to pay for the thing they’re saying I owe but won’t provide a bill for, I’m going to be suspended from continuing classes.

When is the last time ANYone just forked over $800 because someone said ‘Oh I know your finance tab says you only have a current due balance of $150 but this is for last year.  Last year’s bill (that the disbursements from federal aid covered) is what you owe.  Pay no mind to the actual figures.  Oh yeah & sorry but we don’t generally send out bills.’  Or something to that effect.

So here’s the deal.  The real deal, the crux of it all.  In bullet point format (which doesn’t make it any easier to choose the right answer but it does make it faster to type).

Ø  I’m a year away from graduating with a bachelors in English.

Ø  I’ve wanted to finish school for a very long time.

Ø  I’m too close to the end to give up now.

Ø  I recently read some disturbing news about Ashford University and some financial practices that make this situation sit even less well in my gut.

Ø  I’m tired of being in debt.

Ø  I’m never going to stop accumulating debt if I continue going to school anywhere.

Ø  I am nearing the end of a long road but no matter how tough the battle does it really make a difference in the end?

Ø  I want to be able to say that I hold a bachelor’s degree in English.

Ø  I am about to publish a book without a degree.

Ø  I don’t need to take classes called Mind & Machine to self-publish a novel and be a Writer.

Ø  I’ve been a writer for years, now I’ll be a published Author; all still before any diploma would show up.

Ø  I’m sick of school impacting my everyday life.

Ø  I’m afraid of leaving now only to have to start repaying loans in 6 months when I haven’t even sold a single book on the open market yet.

Ø  I’m less marketable in the mainstream job market without a degree.

Ø  I could give a crap less about the mainstream job market and will do just about anything to ensure I can work the way I want – from home, typing for a living and on “tour” singing for my supper.

Ø  I join organizations and no one has asked where I went to school, only what my book is about.

Ø  I’m getting a headache thinking about all of it.

I’m lost with no clue how to solve this volley in my head.  And I could go on for about 600 more bullet points but somehow I don’t think that’s the best source for curing writer’s block you know?

It’s really something to consider because the money already spent isn’t entirely a waste, I gained a lot of knowledge so far, but how can I really truly show that without having that piece of paper in my hand?  And if I leave now isn’t that money all a waste in the long run?  Or is it?  I just don’t know anymore but I do know that I feel like getting a degree is great but getting it from a University that has apparently been using potentially shady practices with hundreds of student’s money really catches in my throat.  Mostly because now I feel like I’m one of them.

Matt says I should just contact the Attorney General in the state of Iowa if they continue to refuse to give me an itemized bill.  Maybe I should do that anyway.  None of this stuff showed up when I first Googled Ashford University when I first considered them as a higher education option.  I’m a 4.0 student but this entire thing just escapes me as making any sort of logical sense.

I know I have to dig deep into my heart & soul to find the answers, I was just hoping I didn’t have to dig into my wallet because that was what financial aid was supposed to be for.  And if I do decide to just pay them so I can resume my classes how invested am I really going to even be now?  Will I slack off knowing all that stuff above has bubbled to the surface or will I continue as usual studying hard and getting good grades?

Most importantly though, what if the exact same thing happens at the end of my next year of school? 

My brain is about to cave in.

Class Is In Session

A while back I indicated that one of my goals was to reenroll in school and that I had started doing some research on colleges that offered degree programs in English that I could complete online. There were a handful of schools here in the Boston area I started with but many of them were a split of campus and online classes and that wasn’t going to work for me.

Its not that I’m lazy or don’t want to meet other people. The real reasons I like studying online truly fall into just two categories -- 1. class starts & ends whenever I want it to and 2. I don’t have to drive anywhere in the snow. Yes, I mean that second reason whole heartedly.

I really considered Salem State because they have an excellent English Lit BA with a track for an MA but I knew on snowy days (okay, this is Boston so probably even some not so snowy days) it would take me upwards of an hour each way to get to and from campus. Then add in the hours spent in class. Okay, but that’s just what happens when you go to college right? Wrong.

In the time it would take me to commute to and from, I could have completely finished another class if I was studying at home.

With that in mind I knew online was the way to go. Again. This foray into continuing my education would be the third try. But this time I’m doing what I truthfully should have done at age eighteen; I’m finishing a program that speaks to me and one I am passionate about. Unlike my last college experience.

I had started a program online with The Art Institute a whole bunch of years ago and to be fair the only reason I left the program is that I knew it wasn’t what I really wanted to be doing for a living. Interior Design, I quickly found, was loads more about politics and number than actual design.

Plus the hours I spent on school (up to and sometimes beyond forty a week and that was per class) made me question if that’s the kind of time I would have to spend per client because it wasn’t my first love and I had to really work for it to get it a lot of the time. Two clients a week and I would have been a puddle of goo.

Now I suppose it’s probably fair to point out that I am what most would call an uber overachiever. I have an innate fear of failure which keeps me motivated to forge on and throw myself one hundred and seventy percent into whatever it is I am doing. School was no exception and I was a 4.0 student because of it.

But the other thing about me is I also have instinctual intuition and I know when the exact second hits that I’ve stayed too long at the party. When I stopped caring if I got my work done, started completely fucking off and decided I would rather play and play all day instead of complete my class work, it was that moment to thank the hostess and bow out gracefully.

So I did and ever since I’ve been itching to go back.

In my sophomore year of high school I knew what I wanted to do. I was good at it (like I mentioned in the post about editing my friend’s paper; more on that in a minute) and really loved it but at age fifteen I had little, if any, self direction or discipline and without being the top of the pack or the bottom of the pack in school I kind of just faded into the very gray middle somewhere, unrecognized but also un-guided in my life path.

At some point in my life, and I really truly have no idea when it happened, I did a complete 180 from total slack-ass procrastinator to seriously over the top OCD overachiever perfectionist. So now that’s where I am today -- the land of striving for perfection, happy to be a geek, doing it all at once without the assistance of any good drugs (well, except caffeine in the mornings of course).

I found a school that really resonated with me and started researching them right away. Based in Iowa but offering a BA with a track to the MA online, fully accredited and well received from all I found when I Googled them, Ashford University is my new school.

And I already love them! My Academic Advisor is based out of San Diego and not only is he the most easy going guy, he’s really knowledgeable and helpful and he insists on being in touch a couple times a week during the first couple classes just to make sure I’m getting the hang of it all. The entire Administrative staff has been great so far and the application process as well as all that financial aid mumbo jumbo was super streamlined on their website. Unlike some of the other schools I looked into where the admission process seemed like it would be more difficult to figure out than the classes!

So starting on January 4, 2011 I’ll officially be a Bachelor of Arts, English major! (But we all know I’m going on for the Masters, I mean seriously…)

In the long run the degree will open up so many more worlds of opportunities to career paths I can pursue if I so choose (like teaching at the college level in many places, being an editor, etc) but the most important thing is that I will feel the sense of accomplishment that I’ve been longing for the past twenty five or so years. And it will ultimately help me when writing novels of course so that’s always a super bonus.

Oh yeah, and that paper of my friend’s that I helped her edit? Yeah, she got a 93 out of 100 so I guess I’m choosing my path well since clearly it was something I already excelled at. (High five for my friend getting an A!! Holla!!) The difference now is that I’ll just have a better handle on all those pronouns and will be able to prove it with that little piece of paper that reads ‘Graduated’.

You’ve Lost that Reckless Feeling

Last weekend, after the Fall Fair where I successfully sold my wares, my mom and aunt came back over to our place for a late lunch and some conversation. We shared a lot of laughs and a few tears but overall it was really a fantastic day and all of us got a lot of stuff off our chests that had been building up for a long time.

As for me, well, with the current state of affairs my mind pretty much became entwined with not much more than the concept of writing and then I made a statement that even surprised me.

“Some time in my past, and I have no idea when, I feel like my train jumped the track. I have no idea what I was supposed to end up doing but I can’t help but feel it was so much more than this.”

And that one tiny statement of admission to myself and the people around me set me off on a very slippery downward spiral for the rest of the weekend. I started to question everything in my life. From where I live to what I do to who I spend my time with to marrying Matt and you know what? Everything is alright now because sometime late Sunday I had another thought.

“It’s never too late, and I’m never too old, to do something about it.”

Now that’s all well and good but the teeny single spaced lines between ‘I’m supposed to do more than this’ and ‘never too late’ were cavernous last week. And it’s funny to me now but as you read this you’ll probably think how amazing it is that I got from points A to B in just forty eight short hours. But believe me, in my head I’ve been trying to get to B since A skipped the rails.

And I think that was back before I was even a teenager but it doesn’t really matter now, all that matters is making the most with what I’ve got.

Because last week was the second of NaNoWriMo, it was the well known week of let downs -- your characters suck, your writing sucks, you should just give up, etc. -- and this year more so than last year it effected the hell out of me.

Let me back up for a second because it isn’t fair to unleash this entire story without a little understanding of my own back story.

Since we moved back to Massachusetts Matt has been the primary income earner in our household. For the two years before we moved back I had taken myself, as Sex and the City Samantha would put it, ‘off the merry go round’ of corporate America to pursue my job with the ladies of faux out on Long Island. It was a great fit for me creatively speaking and I developed skills that I still utilize to this day. Because I felt so good about the new creative based job I had learned, I started a company doing it as soon as we got here. Most of you know it by now, Chucka Stone Designs.

The faux thing didn’t exactly take off like a rocket, but I had a moderately good year for a first year business. Which was good because Matt took a seventy percent pay cut to come back here and pursue something that was never to pan out. But that is a story for another time. Sometime when I have enough perspective to tell it without anger or sadness. Sometime when I can let it go. Sorry, still not there yet.

So I digress…

I did a whole bunch of jobs doing finishing and straight up painting for a couple years and then last year, around the end of the summer, my mom mentioned NaNoWriMo to me. I’d heard of it before but only on the fringes and I had no idea what it was even all about. After a good bit of research I signed up and set my goals on writing a novel in thirty days.

And you know what? Not a single person in my life said I was crazy (not to my face anyway). No one told me I couldn’t do it. Everyone pretty much universally said that I should have been doing it all along because it’s what I’m really good at. These were not new revelations, I had those thoughts myself since age fourteen, its just that I never gave them any weight because I had never figured out how to pursue it. I had no idea how to just become an Author of fiction novels. So instead I did anything but write.

There must be twenty “books” in my library of journals. At least, there could be more, twenty is just a round number guess. Now, I use quotes around the word ‘books’ because most of them are so violently edited at only halfway through (or less) that they have never become more than bleeding ink collectors.

I never felt like I could be an Author because I’d never finished a book. And to be fair, that’s kind of a necessary first step. So I dove into NaNo last year bound and determined to write something that I actually finished. A manuscript length fiction novel that was to become my first ever book.

And you know what? I did it. With their tools and encouragement along the way, the ability to lurk in forums and garner inspiration, and opening my eyes to another world where everything outside my door was simply inspiration ready for the taking, I wrote and completed a book.

I spent the next handful of months editing that book. Then I spent another scattering of months sending out query letters to Agents that I researched in order to sell that book.

And you know what? No one ever talks about this part. With good reason.

The editing of one’s own book (despite the help from three of my biggest cheerleaders ♥love♥) and the follow up of becoming my own sales and marketing representative is a brutal, vicious siege of…no, not rejection. The trouble with this part is the monotony. The waiting. The letters without a reply, the many (many, many, many) months spent going over and over the same old thing. The time between the first book and the second, for me, was a total buzz kill.

I started questioning what the fuck I was even doing with my life. Here I sit, every day, typing away furiously on these keys to create another world and all I want to do is climb into it and never leave. Reality sucks. The real world where bills are due and one’s husband is the only one contributing toward paying them is just, wrong to me.

So I started freaking out. Yes, I certainly had a ‘what does it all mean, fuck this I’m getting a job, I don’t care what I do as long as it pays a lot of money, my brain is going to explode the next time we’re left with seventy five dollars in our bank account’ kind of moment last weekend immediately following the fair.

Again, I should back up. Many of you know that we also filed bankruptcy last year. A big move that I’m not at all ashamed to say was necessary to move on with our lives. But it was another example of the waiting game.

I don’t mean financially, it wasn’t like we were trying to pay all of that stuff related to the house and just unable to do it so that left us with a windfall after the discharge. Quite the opposite. We were exactly the same, just free of the burdens of what happened after one very shady mortgage company allowed us to screw ourselves over many years ago. But we still made the same money and had the same bills the day after the discharge as the day before it if you catch my drift.

So I had put more stock in the feeling of freedom that I assumed would come with doing it. I put too much weight in waiting. Then I just kept waiting, floating endlessly in the sea of murky waters inside my own brain.

Then last weekend it all just caught up to me. There was no magic button. We aren’t transformed into something awesome just because we’re debt free. And oh yeah, I’m not making one freaking dime for all of this effort I’ve put into what I want to do with my life. No matter how many times Matt tells me to ‘stick it out’, ‘just keep working and it will happen’, ‘put myself out there every day’ (because the money he makes now does pay our bills) it occurred to me that if that happens and it takes me say ten years to get a book published, I will never get out of this transition place in my head.

Suddenly money became incredibly important. I started having a full on manic attack that I wasn’t pulling my weight in our family. I started freaking out that what I’m doing is a total and complete waste of time if we end up living in this apartment with no sunlight and no savings for the next whoever knows how long. That no matter how good my words string together, if I can’t sell it then its all for naught.

And then you know what? Matt said something that hit home so heavy I actually caught my breath in my throat -- ‘if you give up now that makes the last two years of my life bullshit.’ It wasn’t a move to make me feel guilty but it all suddenly hit me that he wants me to succeed. That he wants to see me give it everything I’ve got no matter what the consequence to our current financial situation. He has been the silent backdrop for so long. All this time that I’ve been wrapped up in my own head about feeling like I’m in this dire situation he’s been working his fucking ass off to let me have the chance to make something great happen in my life.

And I was just flailing about, squandering that gift. Like an asshole.

It’s hard to explain but it feels like I’ve been doing this job forever, because in my head I actually have. On the one hand, for the past twenty two years I’ve been this big famous Author, or screen writer, or general story teller and I don’t understand why it’s taking so long to make a living at it. On the other hand I hardly finished my first manuscript five minutes ago so how in the hell can I expect that just because I got to the finish line of the first goal I was going to instantly win the race?

I took all of last weekend off to contemplate, and I allowed myself to completely abandon all of my responsibilities for a day on Sunday when I got hammered in the middle of the afternoon and smoked a bunch of pot and didn’t write a word and didn’t work out and didn’t care about the outcome of the day. I simply embraced it for what it was at the time, like it was my last hurrah, and went with it.

And you know what? I woke up on Monday morning (a little off kilter physically I will admit) with an entirely new outlook on everything. I realized that it really doesn’t matter how long it takes as long as I keep at it. Not because Matt wants me to either. Because I want to and with his full support in doing so.

I still didn’t find the magic button where I press it and it lights up the inside of this box where every single answer to my life is written, but I definitely feel like a switch got flicked.

Its one thing to say out loud ‘I’m an Author’ and mean it but it’s quite another to go out there and live it by throwing myself recklessly into the great big unknown pool of destiny. Starting this past Monday, I feel like I’m living it. Finally.

It’s All in My Head

For the past few weeks I have been working on a multitude of sample boards and small furniture pieces as a way to kick start my faux finishing business again. Some of the samples are redo’s of past examples that just fell short, while others are brand new and shiny examples of some of the work I can do. I have been devouring shows on HGTV for inspiration and spending a lot of time reading through posts on the faux message boards I belong to.

One might think this has prompted me to be armed and ready to get out there and tackle the world. My business cards are printed, company bio sheets are ready and in full color, the website and Facebook image galleries are updated and I even have some fantastic ideas of who to hit up for business so, truthfully, I should feel empowered.

But I don’t. All I seem to let myself feel lately is that someone knows I’m not as good as the other finishers and that they will quickly discover I am a fraud.

Yes I am fully aware that this fear is partially irrational but bear with me.

For a long time, longer than I can even pinpoint, I’ve been running around saying I want to be a writer. I want to write books. I want to write for a living. That is great because last November I took advantage of the downtime in the painting industry to do just that for the very first time. And it came out awesome. I mean awesome for a rough first draft. Put it this way, I love my characters to death. (And I'm not sure at this moment if that is pun intended or not.)

Now that I have actually written my first book, however, all I have managed to do with it is a first round of edits (on no more than the first half) and then shoved it into a corner somewhere to collect dust while I go and paint for a living.

You get that? Paint for a living, not write.

If it ever gets finished I know this book will be published, I know it will be purchased because I truly believe that the world I have created and the people who live inside it are just real enough to be relatable but just fantastical enough that real people will want to escape their daily life to visit their alternate realm.

But their world is barely constructed and I’m already trying to paint it.

Inside my head my characters are wandering around trapped inside this box and they keep looking for the door but I have gone and applied a faux finish to every corner of it, so it seems they will never find their way to escape. While I went off and made a paycheck, I boxed them inside the inescapable world and now even I can’t seem to find the door back in.

Is this what (hooker/waitress/) actors feel like? They want to act so badly that they promptly push away the grand opportunity that comes their way in order to go and get paid to set plates down in front of hungry directors so they don’t get thrown out of their apartment?

So now I have this fierce battle raging inside me because I know that all my irrational fears that I’m not a good finisher are total and complete crap. I know I am creative and have come up with a whole slew of interesting and funky treatments over the past few weeks that will be a no brainer to install not to mention fun. So here is the real thing I’m afraid of.

If I pursue a career as a decorative artist, strive to make Chucka Stone Designs all that it can be and start taking on clients all over greater Boston, I am afraid that I will somehow sabotage my own success by claiming it “isn’t what I really want to do” and promptly start whining that I really just want to be a writer again. That’s usually when I crawl back inside my own shell and have a pity party for myself that I never let anyone else become privy to. Instead I talk about how I’m ‘getting stuff together” and how I’m “almost ready” to get out there and work it. I lie to the world knowingly but I’m no longer convincing myself that it’s the truth.

So herein lies the real toughie for me. Why can’t I simply do both -- write and faux?

Easier to ask that question than answer it. Well for me at least. The logical answer is that there is no reason not to. Faux all day, come home at night and edit slowly but surely; maybe even work on the book on the weekends. It isn’t like I have a publishing house banging down my door for this manuscript (yet), screaming that they gave me this advance and now I’m over deadline or something. Nope, it’s just me and my red pen, so timing really isn’t at all of the essence.

So what the fuck is my problem?

The short answer? Me. I am my problem; my own worst enemy most of the time.

I’ll sit here taking days to craft this blog post perfectly, and I do love blogging don’t get me wrong but as soon as it is posted the normal person would grab the 190 pieces of white paper, a red pen and their imagination and go edit for the entire day. Not me though, I am bound to notice one tiny little thing that needs to be fixed on my website to make it perfect, the fact that I never added that other picture to some specific photo album, that I only have 20 business cards in my wallet so those should get printed, that I should really practice drums, that I never did update the proposal form, that I’m running low on something, that I really should write 3-4 GLR posts to front load the week, that I’m hungry, or a multitude of other distractions which will ensure I look at the clock at 3:00 and utter the words ‘wow, can’t believe the day is almost over and I’ve done nothing’.

As is plain to see, I also never got out to visit any Interior Designers, Contractors, Architects, Real Estate Agents, Decorators or other industry pros in this scenario either. So instead of even going to make a paycheck from my decorative work as at least a lucrative distraction, I sit here, doing nothing.

Sure I know it isn’t really “nothing” per se. All those things do indeed get done, but I know deep down that my need to have Perfection in my life has taken over again and that bitch is costing me dearly.

I need to figure out how to trick Perfection to get onto the box, then while I distract it with discussing the cost of the beautiful decorative treatment on the walls (ceiling, floor, furniture pieces…) that they will be paying me for I can liberate my characters from being held hostage by Perfection (for what feels like it has been forever). Use Perfection to provide the financing for Ripple the Twine.

Does that seem like an unreachable goal? Honestly, sometimes it does to me. But others likely just see it as good common sense.

So what am I going to do today? That is of course the real question begging to be answered.

The Time Has Come, a Fact’s a Fact

I run around all the time saying I am a writer but then I never really write anything and it has come to my attention that I am tired of this behavior. So in an effort to actually follow through and become the writer I know is itching to streak across the page, I have decided to do my best to write a little something on my blog everyday for the entire month of May. Some of the stuff I write will be total crap (most likely today will fall into that category) but occasionally a tiny little gem will sneak its way out of my fingers and make its way to your brain where it will be absorbed and laughed about for centuries. Or at least the five minutes it takes to finish reading it.

In an effort to further my “this is really what I have wanted all along, duh” career move into writing I am re-enrolling in school this fall. I have spent so many years trying to fool myself into thinking I wanted to be an Interior Designer or a painter or a seamstress. Admittedly it is true that I do a pretty kick ass job at all of those things but that is simply because I have ‘Over Achiever Perfectionist’ syndrome and if I take it on I will do my best to get a 4.0 in it. A 4.0 GPA in the subject of life is just way too much pressure for this little scrappy gal to handle so it is time to pare it all down.

I have never been one to take on less than my share of projects, in fact most of the time it is too many and one thing or another suffers but I refuse to let it go. As a kid I was smart, straight E’s on my grammar school report card, and then at some point I decided that smart was not cool. When I think back on my high school days I would like to say I was lazy about school work, or that my smarts had simply faded away, but in reality it was the thing I let suffer. I had academics, gymnastics, a job, friends and a boyfriend to focus on; one of those things was surely going to fall further away than the others.

Everyone told me they “knew I could do better” when I graduated high school with a 2.4 GPA. I knew it too but it would have meant less time hanging out, making out or working out and that did not feel right either. I had spread myself so thinly across all of my activities that I became nothing more than average at everything and that drove me insane. So when I went to college as an adult perhaps the O.A.P. took over but I spent at least forty hours a week on my studies to maintain the 4.0 I was so proud of. The problem was I did not truly enjoy the program I was in so the work I put in was meaningless and yet again certain aspects of my life began to suffer; most notably my relationship with Matt.

Once we moved back to Massachusetts and I left the Interior Design program to start my own faux finishing business I ended up with a lot more time on my hands to begin writing down all the things that really mattered to me -- Matt, friends, happiness, love, a clean house, words, music, family, food, bills paid on time and kindness. It was only after I let go of the things I thought I should have that I discovered all the things I really want.

So who knows what all of you might read over the next 30 posts but I hope you enjoy it none the less; I know I would enjoy writing it even if no one was reading.