career Archives | Page 3 of 3 | Dysfunctional Ever After

being on my own

I took a job ten and a half hours and a time zone away in May. Telling my husband, employer, family, and friends was a whirlwind. Before I knew it I was in my car on my way to Northern Michigan. Alone.

I can honestly say I had never really been alone. I went from living with my parents and having them take care of me, to living with my roommates and soon-to-be husband who all took care of me (#ittakesavillage), to living with my husband. I didn’t know what being alone would mean for me.

But I do now. Now I can say I know what it means to be on my own, in a place where I don’t know anyone or where anything is. Now I can say I can do it, I can survive in the unknown. Not only that, but I can thrive. I found myself quickly adjusting to life in Northern Michigan. I had my lunch spot, where the short woman with the short hair knew my order after just going there a handful of times. She was there my first time, and told me all about the restaurant, what was good, what wasn’t her favorite. She quickly became a comforting face. I had a place I went when I needed to chill out. I knew the place I could hide my keys and shoes so no one could see them, and I could roam the beach barefoot. I found my local comfort creatures, the most important of which being Target. I got to know my colleagues as me, Samm. I got to be myself. Not the daughter, the wife, or the friend, just me. I was able to define myself, and be my own person, a luxury I’d never had the opportunity to enjoy.

Being alone is a beautiful thing, especially if it’s temporary. (Which, for the record, it always is.) I quite enjoy being married, having a home, and a dog that I’m responsible for. But I also enjoyed being off and alone. It gave me a renewed sense of confidence. In some odd way, it made me whole. I’m more secure in my marriage because I now know I don’t need my husband. I want my husband, but I most certainly do not need him. I do not need all my things. I want all my things, but I don’t need them.

I must say, it’s quite the relief knowing that at the end of the day, if you have to be alone, you can be.

Late Night Thoughts: when choice is just a nice word

career, family

Women today have so many options… except none at all.

We can be anything we want to be… unless you mean a stay at home mom, girly girl, or domestic diva.

My experience is what people really mean when they say “you can be anything you want to be” is “my generation worked its ass off to pave the way for women like you to do whatever you want to do, so you better take advantage of it.” They certainly don’t mean you can actually do whatever you want to do and actually be whoever you want to be, especially if that means adhering to what society has historically considered a traditional female role. We’ve managed to lock ourselves in a box. We are expected to be educated, make our living outside of the home, and be independent, do-it-all women. To be anything “less” would be dishonoring those who have come before us. Never mind if you find fulfillment in keeping a home, or raising your children. You have other choices that women have fought and died for.

And while “opportunity” for women has never been greater, so has the responsibility. Sure, we can do anything a man can do — and we’re expected to. But men? I haven’t seen any movement telling men they can do anything a woman can do. I don’t see any campaign for men to take off their tie and take on a vacuum. Camouflaged as our advancement, my experience is that women are just being told to do more and are shamed by other women when they opt not to. Women aren’t being told to defy traditional gender roles or stereotypes, women are just being told to take on the mans.

We just have a long way to go.

— 2:06 AM

one in a million

career

Struggling to find a balance between being carefree, open, honest, and yet professional in my writing was paralyzing me. There was no writing on Dysfunctional Ever After, there was no interacting with other bloggers, there was only isolation from the blogging community — and deprivation of what I love, writing and being in relation with others.

While I feel comfortable saying that everyone I currently work with knows the truly obnoxious yet intelligent person I am, I was so terrified of a potential employer finding my blog and dismissing me because of a few blog posts I wrote on my own time (and likely in the middle of the night). I work in a business that’s small and always changing. It’s totally normal to skip from job to job every year or two, so it’s wise to treat everyone you speak with as a future employer or employee. It’s my job to know what I’m doing, it’s my job to tell others what they should do, it’s my job to be put together, and sometimes it’s my job to sell people. So first and foremost, I need to be able to sell myself. And how could I do that if my blog post about Kourtney Kardashian was their first impression? I couldn’t. So I said bucket.

Today I signed on to my blog and saw that sometime in the last month I hit a million page views. It might not seem like a lot to some people, but one million page views on a blog I really hadn’t put any effort into the last three years (and only had about 400 blog posts published) seems like a lot to me.

And that is exactly when I said bucket.

I deleted every single blog post. Pictures have been removed, links deleted, and words erased. That might sound like I’m running away from something, or I’m ashamed of what I’ve written in the past. I’m not. What deleting those posts does for me is it gives me the opportunity to rebrand myself in this small space. It allows me to reevaluate what personally identifying information I share on here. (For example, old posts included a link to my personal twitter account. Not anymore.) My last name won’t be included in new posts, unlike some previous ones. This creates what I see as a safer space. No matter how cheesy that sounds, that’s exactly what this means to me. Dysfunctional Ever After was created to be a safe place for me, and I want it to go back to that.

The most trying part of adulthood is balance. Balance between what I love, who I am, and what the world says I should love, and who the world says I should be. Balance between being true to myself, and true to the world I’ve decided to live in. I’ve never been graceful. I’ve never been careful enough to do a balancing act. But I’m trying.