Busy Busy Busy Again!

The past week I've been busier'n a beaver writing copy for clients at Elance and via Paypal. It has been truly amazing.  An awful lot of the business (all new clients!) has come just recently, and one of the newbies wants me to write/edit/copy-enhance scads more for him, HALLELUJAH!

My plan is to stash away as much of this boon as I can so I'm never again as strapped as I have been recently. It has been no fun, no fun at all!

I raised my rates to compensate for the extra time and expense it's taking me to find decent, interesting projects at Elance. I think that has also cued the businesses who are looking for good writers to look more closely at me.  Strangely enough, I think my rates were too low for anyone to deem me worth their consideration. Savvy businesses know what a good copywriter can charge on the open market and wonder why we'd ever charge less.  I charge less because I don't think I have to make a killing to make a living; I don't believe in charging businesses more just because I can!

I've been very croupy all week, too, with a terrible cold. (I mentioned this in an earlier blog, I think.) I had to farm out last week's mid-week church nursery gig; managed to make it there on Sunday, but it was a struggle.  I'm still fighting the tail end of it...

I've missed two networking events that I really, really wanted to attend, but I was afraid I'd infect everyone in attendance, so I stayed away. (Didn't have the energy to get dressed up, anyway. One great thing about working from home is you can do it in jeans and a t-shirt... or jammies and a robe. There's nobody to impress; my copy speaks for itself!)

Guess that's about it for this time.  Just thought I'd better check in and let you know I'm still alive. 

Hope your Thanksgiving Day was terrific!

FROM GODVINE--Get a Hanky!

A Lesson in Love

Carl was a quiet man. He didn't talk much. He would always greet you with a big smile and a firm handshake.

Even after living in our neighborhood for over 50 years, no one could really say they knew him very well.

Before his retirement, he took the bus to work each morning. The lone sight of him walking down the street often worried us.


He had a slight limp from a bullet wound received in WWII. Watching him, we worried that although he had survived WWII, he may not make it through our changing uptown neighborhood with its ever-increasing random violence, gangs, and drug activity.


When he saw the flyer at our local church asking for volunteers for caring for the gardens behind the minister's residence, he responded in his characteristically unassuming manner. Without fanfare, he  just signed up.


He was well into his 87th year when the very thing we had always feared finally happened. He was just finishing his watering for the day when three gang members approached him. Ignoring their attempt to intimidate him, he simply asked, "Would you like a drink from the hose?"


The tallest and toughest-looking of the three said, "Yeah, sure," with a malevolent little smile.


As Carl offered the hose to him, the other two grabbed Carl's arm, throwing him down. As the hose snaked crazily over the ground, dousing everything in its way, Carl's assailants stole his retirement watch and his wallet, and then fled.


Carl tried to get himself up, but he had been thrown down on his bad leg. He lay there trying to gather himself as the minister came running to help him..


Although the minister had witnessed the attack from his window, he couldn't get there fast enough to stop it. "Carl, are you okay? Are you hurt?" the minister kept asking as he helped Carl to his feet.


Carl just passed a hand over his brow and sighed, shaking his head. "Just some punk kids. I hope they'll wise-up someday." His wet clothes clung to his slight frame as he bent to pick up the hose. He adjusted the nozzle again and started to water.


Confused and a little concerned, the minister asked, "Carl, what are you doing?"


"I've got to finish my watering. It's been very dry lately," came the calm reply.


Satisfying himself that Carl really was all right, the minister could only marvel. Carl was a man from a different time and place.

A few weeks later the three returned. Just as before their threat was unchallenged. Carl again offered them a drink from his hose.


This time they didn't rob him. They wrenched the hose from his hand and drenched him head to foot in the icy water.


When they had finished their humiliation of him, they sauntered off down the street, throwing catcalls and curses, falling over one another laughing at the hilarity of what they had just done.

Carl just watched them. Then he turned toward the warmth giving sun, picked up his hose, and went on with his watering.


The summer was quickly fading into fall Carl was doing some tilling when he was startled by the sudden approach of someone behind him. He stumbled and fell into some evergreen branches.


As he struggled to regain his footing, he turned to see the tall leader of his summer tormentors reaching down for him. He braced himself for the expected attack.


"Don't worry old man, I'm not gonna hurt you this time." The young man spoke softly, still offering the tattooed and scarred hand to Carl. As he helped Carl get up, the man pulled a crumpled bag from his pocket and handed it to Carl.


"What's this?" Carl asked.


"It's your stuff," the man explained. "It's your stuff back, even the money in your wallet." "I don't understand," Carl said. "Why would you help me now?"

The man shifted his feet, seeming embarrassed and ill at ease. "I learned something from you," he said. "I ran with that gang and hurt people like you. We picked you because you were old and we knew we could do it. But every time we came and did something to you, instead of yelling and fighting back, you tried to give us a drink. You didn't hate us for hating you. You kept showing love against our hate." He stopped for a moment. "I couldn't sleep after we stole your stuff, so here it is back." He paused for another awkward moment, not knowing what more there was to say.. "That bag's my way of saying thanks for straightening me out, I guess." And with that, he walked off down the street.


Carl looked down at the sack in his hands and gingerly opened it. He took out his retirement watch and put it back on his wrist.

Opening his wallet, he checked for his wedding photo. He gazed for a moment at the young bride that still smiled back at him from all those years ago.


He died one cold day after Christmas that winter. Many people attended his funeral in spite of the weather. In particular the minister noticed a tall young man that he didn't know sitting quietly in a distant corner of the church.


The minister spoke of Carl's garden as a lesson in life. In a voice made thick with unshed tears, he said, "Do your best and make your garden as beautiful as you can. We will never forget Carl and his garden."


The following spring another flyer went up. It read: "Person needed to care for Carl's garden."

The flyer went unnoticed by the busy parishioners until one day when a knock was heard at the minister's office door.

Opening the door, the minister saw a pair of scarred and tattooed hands holding the flyer. "I believe this is my job, if you'll have me," the young man said.


The minister recognized him as the same young man who had returned the stolen watch and wallet to Carl.


He knew that Carl's kindness had turned this man's life around. As the minister handed him the keys to the garden shed, he said, "Yes, go take care of Carl's garden and honor him."

The man went to work and, over the next several years, he tended the flowers and vegetables just as Carl had done.

In that time, he went to college, got married, and became a prominent member of the community. But he never forgot his promise to Carl's memory and kept the garden as beautiful as he thought Carl would have kept it.


One day he approached the new minister and told him that he couldn't care for the garden any longer. He explained with a shy and happy smile, "My wife just had a baby boy last night, and she's bringing him home on Saturday."


"Well, congratulations!" said the minister, as he was handed the garden shed keys. "That's wonderful! What's the baby's name?"

"Carl," he replied.

INTERSEX: DIFFERENT--NOT DEFECTIVE

INTERSEX: DIFFERENT—NOT DEFECTIVE

© 2011 Kristine M. Smith

THIS COMMENTARY MAY BE REPRINTED FREELY AS LONG AS THE COPYRIGHT NOTICE AND THE BYLINE/TAGLINE AT THE END REMAINS IN THE PUBLISHED PIECE.

Intersex is the last “hidden shame.”
It’s time to acknowledge and celebrate what makes us unique.

Since turning 60, with recurrent frequency I’ve been asked, “Have you ever been married?” “Why didn’t you ever marry?” by friends—sometimes even by casual acquaintances who linger long enough to wonder why I never mention a husband or children.


Back in the day, I’d just lie. I’d joke, “Never found anyone I could put up with 24/7/365!” or “Never found anyone who could put up with me!” Or I’d say, more seriously, “I’ve seen too many failed marriages—or even successful ones—that I’d never want to be part of.”


The reason I lied is because I never realized, until just this past year, how many people “like me” there are in the world. As soon as I understood the phenomenon and how frequent it is (it occurs as frequently as natural red hair, which I also have; I seem to have won the Lottery of Oddities!), I thought it ridiculous that society would elect to sweep us under the rug rather than acknowledge that we’re here in number and we’re every bit as viable as the rest of y’all are.


I’m not gay. I don’t think a lot of today’s gays are actually gay. I think a lot of them were “repaired” shortly after birth because frantic parents didn’t know what else to do with an ambiguously-sexed infant and wanted to give it the most normal life possible—and, as the less-than-classy saying goes in surgical wards, “It’s easier to make a hole than to entertain a pole.” (It’s easier to excise external maleness and raise a baby as a girl so “she” never has to suffer the consequences of living with an ever-present “birth defect.”)


I’m Speculating Here


When it comes to my own birth condition, I’m speculating. When I contacted Intersex Allies to find out how to determine whether or not I was an intersex baby, I was told it would cost thousands of dollars in tests, unless I could find my medical records from infancy—but that IF I found my medical records, they wouldn’t necessarily be trustworthy, because many were altered (just as intersex infants were routinely altered until about 20 years ago, when it became apparent that assigning gender doesn’t work mentally and emotionally over the long term for most patients.)


A thoughtful, warm, concerned psychiatrist at Intersex Allies wanted to know how I would feel if I did discover I was altered at birth. I said, “Relieved.” He seemed a bit surprised. He inquired, “Not angry?” I said, “I don’t think so. Maybe a little robbed. But I know that parents want what is best for their children, absolutely. I just don’t think they always know what’s best.”


He asked if I’m depressed or negatively affected in any other way by my gender identity concerns. I said, “No. I guess at times I feel LONELY—like I’m the only one out here who’s like me.” He assured me I’m not: something like one in every 300 babies is born with the condition.


He inquired further: “What would you do about it if you discovered you were altered?” I said, “Nothing. There’s no way I’d put loved ones through the anxiety of having to relate to me in a different way—not at my age. I’ve seen what transgendered people have to put up with; I’ve watched what happened to Chaz Bono and to a friend of mine who simply had to ‘fix’ what they felt was ‘wrong’ about them. The level of hatred (ignorance, really) in this society for people with gender identity issues is intense. I’d never volunteer for that. I’m at peace with who I am, despite the isolation it causes.”


He told me, “Even if you took the tests, they might be inconclusive. So you might end up back at square one. Your internal orientation is your best gauge. If you’ve felt this way your entire life, you’re not wrong. Your experience is your experience. It’s as legitimate as anyone else’s where gender identity is concerned.”


Family Matters


After I had this conversation with the Intersex Allies psychiatrist, I began to revisit my childhood. A lot of dots began to connect. It was a dizzying eye-opener.


The fact is I have never felt female. I was appalled when my chest budded into bumps, then breasts. I was horrified when I got my period. Until these atrocities came along I was completely happy imagining I would grow up to be a cowboy, a bronc buster, a fireman, an actor. My favorite toys were trains and plastic horses. (My plastic horses were always “humping” other plastic horses.)


When my hormones kicked in, my sexual fantasies were male-on-female: I was always the male. When I started (what adults considered) “falling in love” with actors—Roy Rogers, Jack Lord, Robert Preston, Jerry Lewis, and others—my fantasies surrounding them were that I was them, that I was inside their bodies experiencing their lives from their points of view. I never fantasized them as being my lovers.


Other clues


Dad told me that when I was born, “at first we thought you had a birth defect.” When I asked why, he hesitated briefly and then changed the subject: “You weighed just five pounds [I was a full-term baby]; you lost two pounds right away. The doctor said not to name you because you probably wouldn’t live. You fit inside a cigar box. Your butt was the size of the tips of two of my fingers.” What Dad described was “small” and “at risk” but in no way “defective.”


When I was about 22 I did something (I don’t recall what, now) that made Dad enormously proud. He lit up and proclaimed, “That’s my boy!” The moment he said it, he blanched and apologized; he was nearly apoplectic! I told him, “It’s all right, Dad.”


Of course, it wasn’t all right—not then. He and Mom had raised me as a girl. Even so, I felt it was the confirmation I’d been seeking. It just felt right to be called his boy.


Now, a lot of people may say that my gender identity issues are entirely my Dad’s fault, that he must have signaled to me that he wanted a boy. I don’t think that’s it. Mom and Dad had a third child. She was named after Dad (Jack LeRoy/Jackie Lee). If anyone should have felt pressure to “be Dad’s boy,” it would have been Jackie. So as far as I’m concerned, Dad’s off the hook. I am convinced that my gender identity was established inside Mom’s womb by God.


I never asked my parents about this. Sadly, I didn’t know, before they died, how common intersex is, or I might have.


I have told my two sisters about this. One says, “It doesn’t surprise me.” The other totally rejects the notion, saying: “You’re one of the most female women I know. And Dad would never have allowed doctors to alter a son, even if it meant surgery down the road (to remove female parts].”


Really?! 60 years ago? I think Dad would have done what the doctors believed at the time to be in the best interest of his child and all concerned. (Doctors no longer respond this way to intersex births, thank God!)


These days when people ask me why I never married, I ask them if they’re ready to hear the truth or whether they want my standard lie. Most want the truth. So far, every person I’ve told has accepted it; none have ever mentioned knowing anyone else like me. That’s how hidden the condition is. I suspect every adult knows at least one intersex person; they just aren’t aware of it. People all too often assume unmarried people are gay, anti-social or neurotic. What many of us actually are never even occurs to them.


We’re often lonely—on the outside looking in—but we’re loving, funny, and completely, utterly human. Those of us who have accepted our fates are as normal and contributory as you are. Those of us who haven’t are struggling mightily.


Here’s a common quote I embrace: “Find ways to be especially kind to everyone you meet. Everyone is facing some kind of battle.”


My battle (with regard to my gender identity issue) has ended. These days I tell the truth and let the chips fall where they may. And you know what? It feels good to be loved for exactly who I am. Hiding in plain sight sucked.

#

Kristine M. Smith is the author of six books and a well-regarded freelance copywriter.  She is available for interviews or forums on any subject matter she writes about or has written books about. You can reach her at kristine m smith AT msn DOT com.

Freelance Copywriter Rates in the U.S.

If you ever ask yourself why freelance writers in the U.S. charge so much for their work:

• we don't get paid vacations

• we don't get paid sick days

• we don't get bonuses for outstanding work or for Christmas

• We don't have insurance plans

• We don't qualify for unemployment when work doesn't materialize 

• We live in a very expensive economy and  can't compete with developing country rates and continue to provide high-quality work

Please remember all this the next time you're tempted to wonder or complain.

Although we enjoy our work...(sadly)...enjoyment doesn't pay the rent.

This is one of the few businesses still in existence where you can still Buy American!  So please support your fellow Americans!


Repost if you're a freelancer or love one.

Giving Thanks

It's so easy to get "down in the dumps" in the world we're presently living in. Add to that a nasty head and chest cold--and it's even easier.

I've been sleeping, coughing and sneezing when not writing for clients for the past two days...and it doesn't look like it's going to get any easier in the next day or so.  I may even have to stay home for Thanksgiving! That would be so un-cool!

I've already bailed on my nursery duty for this week at church. It's just one day, but I hated doing it.  That's when every one of the people who volunteer with me there stepped in and said they'll pinch hit for me.  It took a load off my mind, for sure...

Getting that enthusiastic response led me to think of other ways I'm thankful.

I'm thankful I have a passion/skill that is carrying me through this recession. I've been so busy writing this week (after a brief famine) that I'm going to be okay again this month. (It's a month to month thing.)  I don't have any "discretionary" income, so there'll be no holiday gifts from me this year, but the people who love me couldn't care less about that. I'm thankful for that!

I'm thankful for those of you who contact me on Facebook, by email, by phone, or right here  to let me know you're thinking of me and praying for me.

I'm thankful I have friends, near and far, who go to bat and "defend"  me when I can't (or won't) do it myself, even when they're a little or a lot over the top and I have to reel them back in!

I'm thankful for my faith. Without it, I'd be anxious almost non-stop trying to make a living in the only way available to me right now--and in the only way I've ever wanted to make a living: via the written word.

I'm thankful for healthy pets and a loving family.

I'm thankful for a gazillion other things, but I need to lie down again.  Just thought I'd take a moment to wish every one of you a Happy Thanksgiving. I hope you're every bit as blessed and thankful as I am and as you deserve to be.  You've blessed me: I hope you reap what you sow a hundred times over.

Hugs!

Holiday Gift SERVAL SON SPECIAL OFFER

If you'll order SERVAL SON direct from me for $20, I'll personalize the copy(ies) to whomever you want and ship them directly to you or to the gift recipient as long as you both live in the United States.

This offer is good until December 15th while my home stash of SERVAL SON lasts.


Yes, you can get the book for less at Amazon but it won't be personalized.

My email address is kristine m smith AT msn DOT com (all one word). E me and I'll provide my snail mail address so you can send the $20. OR if you prefer to pay via Paypal, we can make those arrangements, too.


Tell your animal-loving friends about this offer, too. SOON!


Thanks!

"SERVAL SON" TOTALS: UNKNOWN AT THIS POINT!

Some folks are waiting with 'bated breath to find out how many copies of SERVAL SON have sold. I'm not sure I'll ever know the answer to that on any given day because the sales come in at different times from different channels.

I guess it's sufficient to say I will not be retiring on royalties from the book, or any of the others I have written, even in combination!  The books (in combination) give me a mini-boost every few months when royalties roll in, but the boost is by no means substantial. If I had to rely on my books to sustain me, I'd have gone under a decade ago! 

It's my copywriting gigs that keep my head above water... and in this economy, sometimes they're so few and far between that I have to take huge gulps of air to survive between surfacings!

But that's the way of life for most Creatives. 

You're used to hearing about the Big Guns who can command Big Bucks even before they've put a single word on paper. They're the ones "crowned" by mass media and given free and frequent access to the hallowed halls of television studios. The rest of us get by working hard to put the word out  into cyberspace in the hopes that those who buy the book will review it, chat it up, and help us keep the word going around that (like the Whos in Whoville) "We're here! We're here!"  Wee'uns like us need Hortons (like you! Bless you all!) who hear us and then carry our message to the powers that be...

I'm still just squeaking by. But I'm happy, I'm challenged, and I'm not stopping. 

Who knows how soon I'll get fully up on my water skis and be able to stand without the heavy flow of water pushing them into my feet and legs?  However long it takes--or if it never happens at all--I'll still be here doing this, because it's what I was born to do.

Stringing words together is my passion. It always has been; it always will be.  If there's no need for it in heaven, I'll be miserable there! (But not as miserable as I am here when nothing comes in to do. I won't have the cloud of insolvency hanging over my head in heaven! That will be a huge relief!)

Books don't sell like hotcakes unless authors get mainstream publicity. Although SERVAL SON reached #2 and #4 in two niche categories (animal welfare/rights and Nature/Fauna) on the day it debuted, it was never in competition with the likes of Bishop T.D. Jakes, a Bill or Hilary Clinton, and that gang of bestseller celebs. That would be expecting a lot more of it than I was--although Stephanie Ealy seems to think that when (not if) the right producer in Hollywood sees it, it will catch fire and become the next Marley and Me. (From her pen to Hollywood's ears!!!)  

So, in answer to your question, "Are you rich yet?" I will respond, "Ha ha ha ha ha." 

In answer to your question, "Are you worried?" I'll answer, "Only infrequently--because I know Who has my back."

In answer to your question, "Will you ever consider 'getting real' and going back to a real job?"  I'll confess (blush), "I've tried, hundreds of times these past few years, but nobody's pounding down my door."

But you know what? Even if I did go back to 9 to 5 (or whatever else I could get), my evenings and weekends would still be devoted to stringing words together. I'm addicted. Writing lights up my brain the way cocaine or ??? (whatever else!) lights up addicted folks' brains. I get high when I write--100% naturally!

And because no one I've applied to has shown any interest in hiring me (although I certainly qualify), I take that to mean that God is happy that I'm doing what I love, too.   It's 10-12 hour work days  plus evenings and weekend looking for writing work, 2-3 hour days actually writing (on average), but... I'm happy!!! Try explaining that to a non-Creative!