Not make time to write. Or so I said before Ragsy was born. After a nearly two-year hiatus (yes, I've been writing some during that time - just not regularly and mostly for work), I've finally found a tentative rhythm that gets me writing some more. Usually it means sacrificing sleep and getting a little less done around the house. But, oh well. I was never a neat freak anyway and my husband has always remarked on how little sleep I need to function well.
So it has begun. In the last month, I've completed about 20,000 words, some of which I've trashed, some have been quick & dirties to get me going in the first place and only about a quarter of those have been spent on my long lost novel, which book proposal I was about to send into an editor acqaintance who was really excited about it when I went into labor. Given the rusty hinges and joints of my writing ability now versus what it was after two years of being a freelance smut and business writer, I'm thinking I'll finish a good two thirds of the novel before I dust off the proposal. I know I can make business cases - I do it every day in my double life as a product manager, but don't usually have to throw in the clinchers that go along with a fiction proposal.
So that's that. In other news, I'm not a big fan of my job, but most people know that. Which is fine. It's not unbearable and, to be truthful, it's one of the best things I could ever have done for myself career-wise, particularly if I want to keep increasing my salary and stature at future positions. But in the next few months, I need to do a lot of thinking.
It struck me after having a conversation with a co-worker - who's also not happy - that, before you start a process, you need to have a vision of what you want on the other side. The same is true for employment. I understand generally the demands on my time I'm willing to deal with - my priorities are vastly different than they were when I started the job I'm in now - and I know what I'm worth (a good 20-30K more than I'm making now, but that's true for a lot of people) but what can I do that will make me feel good while I'm there and not have me staring at the clock? Good question.
To date, I haven't been in a position where that could be a consideration. I'd gotten my masters, refused a PhD candidacy and had done a 180 on my career choice and had to start from the bottom. Now I'm at the high end of the middle and I have a little more latitude and bargaining power.
What I do now used to make me feel good, but it's hard to quantify and provide a case for promotion, even though anywhere else the things I do would be director-level or above. We have some tough products and even tougher clients, internal and external, which have taught me a lot about diplomacy, preparation and have given me an extraordinarily thick skin.
All of these are good things. But it's starting to get old and wear on me. I expected to have to do a balancing act and I knew it would be hard. But I feel like I'm penalized for putting my family first. So this time, I'm going to go about things differently because I can. When I took the job, my priority was job security since we were having a new baby. It was also a smart choice since I got in on the ground level of a never-before-launched product and it gave me a unique perspective, knowledge base and skill set that only a small handful of people in the country have. Now, what am I gonna do with it?
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