Tag Archives: Work

Sep 27 2024
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Things Change

“There is nothing permanent except change.” — Heraclitus

“The only way to make sense out of change is to plunge into it, move with it, and join the dance.” —Alan Watts 

As a person of a certain age — my favorite euphemism for old —change is an undeniable truth of life. As I write, it’s the eve of autumn, the changing of the seasons, and the day before a memorial service for a coworker, confidant, and friend. Things Change has also been the theme of this year, and the title of my 17th annual journal, which begin in September. It’s also the final chapter of my life — no longer a dress rehearsal — yet an opportunity “To change the things I can” and leave a legacy behind, the measure of my life. Continue reading →

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Mar 21 2020
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Dispatch from the Hideout: Pandemic Edition

“If you lived here, you’d be home by now.” — Firesign Theater

Yes, I’m home, homebound, socially distancing, not quite in a lockdown, not totally self-quarantining. I’m staying in, doing my civic duty to protect our community and to keep myself healthy. Do I get a Girl Scout Badge for that?

I’ve been socially distancing to some degree since February 28th when I was laid-off from my job which was eliminated due to a company reorganization. In the interim, I’ve conducted a job search, applied and received Unemployment Compensation, registered at the Department of Workforce Development (DWD) Job Center, and gratefully, interviewed for a couple of positions before the community spread of COVID-19 changed everything. I also had a few dates with friends for coffee and/or brunch. I delivered birthday cards to my niece Gemma and nephew Quinn. With their mother, my sister, Tami, we visited outside, 6-feet apart, and I elbow-bumped my brother-in-law, Ron. All that has now ended too. Continue reading →

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Jan 19 2018
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Posts

Another Trip Around the Sun

“My life is better with every year of living it.” — Rachel Maddow

“Write it on your heart that every day is the best day in the year.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson

Grateful. The past weekend I celebrated another trip around the sun, 365 days, one-day-at-a-time. Songs come to mind, the first from the soundtrack of my life as a young woman growing up in the fifties and sixties, Bob Dylan’s, My Back Pages, followed by memories of people, both here and gone, and my gratitude for their presence in my life, Rufus Wainwright’s cover of Who Knows Where the Time Goes?  Continue reading →

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Feb 25 2017
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Posts

No More 9 to 5!

UPDATE 02/25/2020: Three years ago, I began working part-time for my employer for whom I had worked full-time as a manager for almost 10 years. I became an hourly employee and the trade-off was I was able to work 20 hours a week and have three-day weekends.

Now that this job is ending, due to a company reorg, I’m reconsidering returning to full-time employment if I can combine my professional and avocational experience. In this third chapter of my life, I’d like to do work that aligns with my passions and commitment to social justice. Following is the original post from February 25, 2017.

It’s still winter in Wisconsin. After a week of record-breaking temperatures of spring-like weather — a hopeful tease of things to come — then came the rain, sleet, ice pellets, followed by snow and howling winds. We’re reminded that winter remains for a few more weeks before spring arrives. Spring is a season of hope and new beginnings. So is my life today, as I cross the threshold of my third act. Cue up Dolly Parton, no more “9 to 5.”  Continue reading →

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Sep 20 2015
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Posts

Pick a Metaphor: Life-Planning

  1. The Three Boxes of Life
  2. Whack-a-Mole
  3. Juggling: When All the Balls Are in the Air

As readers of my blog already know, I like to mix metaphors. Today I introduce the first installment of another Mixed Metaphors, Oh My! series entitled, Pick a Metaphor.  In this series I will choose a topic and look at it based on a number of metaphors. What I have found in my own life is that sometimes the metaphor I select to describe an issue I’m facing sets the tone of how I will think and feel about it.  Continue reading →

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Sep 06 2015
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The Pleasures (and Lessons) of a Staycation

“A vacation that is spent at one’s home enjoying all that home and one’s home environs have to offer.”— Urban Dictionary

“You don’t have to go far to travel.” — Me

It’s that time of year again when September arrives and I extend the Labor Day holiday by taking my annual Staycation. While students return to school after their families unpack from vacation and pack those back-to-school backpacks full of brand new school supplies, I take a break from my day-to-day work routines and make my “to-do only if I want to lists.”   Continue reading →

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Apr 27 2014
Posts

Lost & Found

Finding Vivian Maier

Yesterday I saw the film, Finding Vivian Maier. It is the previously untold story of a street and portrait photographer. Ms. Maier’s portraits were not staged or styled. Her subjects were often captured surreptitiously as she marched out into to the streets of Chicago with the children in her care. Vivian was a nanny to some of Chicago’s upper middle-class and wealthy families who lived along the North Shore of Lake Michigan. She left her job as a seamstress in New York to become a nanny so she could find ways to be outdoors, to be out in the world yet still hide in plain sight. Vivian was an undercover artist. Continue reading →

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Apr 20 2014
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Posts

Journal/Journey

“What matters in life is not what happens to you but what you remember and how you remember it.” ― Gabriel García Márquez

Years before I started writing for others, I wrote poetry and journaled for myself. Sometimes I would share a poem with the person who inspired it yet seldom a journal entry. Journaling by its very nature is a private act, a conversation with oneself, often a daily record of happenings, experiences and observations. Sometimes our loved ones or curious friends or colleagues surreptitiously read our journals. Much is written about the consequences of reading someone’s journal without the author’s permission.

Continue reading →

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Mar 16 2014
Posts

The Vibrator Story

People and families have a personal narrative history and so do places. My birthplace, my hometown, Racine, Wisconsin has one. It is the story of a factory town which attracted European immigrants, beginning with French explorers in 1699 who established trading posts at the mouth of the Root River where it empties into Lake Michigan.

Continue reading →

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Feb 16 2014
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Posts

Musings on a Year of Writing

“I’ve learned that by the practice of writing with intention, discipline, and passion, I became a writer.”

This past week marks a year, the anniversary, the birthday of this blog. I’ve been writing as an avocation for over 35 years, beginning with poetry, followed by recovery journals, stand-up comedy and monologue scripts, memoir writing, and finally as an activist-essayist.  Since starting this blog and maintaining a practice of writing at least weekly, I’ve become the thing I’ve been doing. I’m a writer. Continue reading →

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