Working Mother (Effer)

Yesterday Curtis and I were getting all testy and argumentative, also known as doing the budget: the fastest way to make two normally compatible people look like candidates for the Jerry Springer Show. And it became painfully clear that my freelance writing gig just isn't cutting it. I've been doing it for seven years now, and I love to write, but let's face it. Freelance anything is competitive - sometimes I spend more time scouting out jobs than actually doing work - and the pay is not what you'd call reliable. (I once waited a year for a check I was expecting within a month.)

So Curtis dropped the bomb. The J-word ... as in job. As in taking-my-kids-to-daycare, brushing-my-hair-before-noon, non-flexible-scheduling employment. He says it was a "suggestion" and that I shouldn't take it so personally; I say it was a "get-your-ass-out-there-and-do-something-more-lucrative." Potato, potahto. The point is ... it's something I need to think about.

But y'all? I've been a freelance writer for seven years now, and a work-at-home Mom for five of those. I have very little "real world" work experience. I didn't finish college (hoo needs awl that fancey lernin' ennyhow?). And I don't even need to mention the state of the economy and the struggling workforce. If I don't want to work at McDonald's (and just for the record: I don't), I'm going to have to have a decent resume. But what am I supposed to put on it? That I waitressed for six months when I was fourteen? That I had a temp job at a market research firm? That I worked part-time stocking the freezer section of the Ramstein Air Base commissary, and was then promoted to freezer and bread?

Sigh.

I had (magical, cotton-candy-scented-unicorn) dreams of the blog becoming a book deal. Or of someone reading it and being like, "Hey! This chick can write about poop!" and hiring me on-the-spot as a regular parenting columnist somewhere. I know, right? I also dreamed about marrying Prince William, and we all see how that turned out (thanks a lot, Kate Middleton, for ruining my shot at the monarchy).

So before I work on a resume, I'm compiling a list of my skills. Here's what I have so far:

- Writing (duh).
- Typing. Like really really fast.
- Spelling (hey, that's gotta count for something, right?).
- Meeting tight deadlines.
- Coming up with stuff that makes people laugh ... at least some of the time.
- Cleaning up messes that would make most people run screaming.
- Getting two children to nap simultaneously (hey. That IS a skill).
- Making a kick-ass meal ... with dessert.
- Eating aforementioned dessert.
- Pretending that I don't think farts are funny for the purpose of teaching my sons some manners.
- Decoding babyspeak and various childhood speech impediments.
- Planning and executing a menu for an entire month.
- Drawing cartoons (coincidentally, about the perils of working from home in this case).
- Keeping my house generally put-together despite the presence of three rambunctious little boys.
- Speaking in a variety of accents and crazy voices.

Think there's a job out there for me? Maybe someone needs a receptionist who answers one call in a British accent, and the next in the voice of Widget from "Wow Wow Wubbzy." Or a recipe-tester who, like, types them up afterwards. Or an elephant-poop-shoveler.

This is gonna be hard.