I'm feeling reflective this evening, so thought it would be a good time to put something down here. I'm not feeling depressed or moody, hopeful or pessimistic; it's just lots of thoughts moving in a pool inside my head; the eddies of the present mixing with the past and future with no judgment, just review, reflection and comprehension.
Had my first website presentation today at Pearce Plastics. Everyone seemed very receptive, but the owner is a 90-year-old Republican who does not use the Internet, and although he gets the concept of a website's marketing potential, he also has little grasp of how a site works or what elements are available to use or how best to exploit web interactivity to draw in new customers while maintaining contact with current ones.
I held my own and tried to explain things without sounding like I was talking to a six-year-old, and I came off professionally polished. The presentation was well laid out and didn't give too much away in the way of artwork or concepts. At the end of the meeting, I was told they'd have a decision by next Wednesday, when Steve and I come back from our trip to Eureka.
I've come to the point in my unemployment where I do not look back on my old job at the Reporter with nostalgia any more than I do other past events in my life. Nor am I really at a point of anticipating what new work might be just around the corner for me, and the idea of pitching this website feels good. It's all mine. If we go with it (and I think we will), it may be the first of many and, who knows, I may just have a design studio emerging from my Mac up here in the office.
Ever since my mom's estate closed and I received my part, I have been shifting back and forth between things that are plannable: At first I was focused on taking part of the money and remodeling the house: bamboo floors, new counters and cabinet fronts in the kitchen, new lighting, etc. Not so much to have a nice place to live in (although we'd have that), but improvements that would make the place more sellable when we decide to retire.
That's partly what the trip to Eureka is about: Steve has always wanted to live near the ocean, and I dearly want to move to a small town that's not in danger of being engulfed by a nearby metropolis. Also, home prices are low enough in Humboldt County that we could sell our two-bedroom condo here in Pasadena and move into a three-bedroom house up there. And, of course, there's the natural splendor all around and things are so green. The weather's cool, and we both love cloudy, rainy days.
I've visited there and loved every minute of it, especially the long walks in the primeval forests. Steve has never visited, so it's my job to get him to fall in love with it in four days; not quite as long as it took us to fall in love with one another, but if he leaves wanting to go back, I think my task will have been accomplished.
So I'm thinking that putting together a web design studio of my own wouldn't be such a bad idea; it would make a great retirement career. That's the nice thing about working in retirement; you just need to generate enough money to pay the bills and have a vacation or two each year. But to get there means I have to start making some serious money again soon, and I'm not sure when that's going to happen. If someone doesn't have a good-paying job out there for me, perhaps I can make up one of my own.
Another reflection today: My niece Amanda is giving birth on Thursday. As Steve and I are winging up to the redwoods, Amanda will be having labor induced. It used to be that the blessed event came in its own time, like the miracle that it is. Now they schedule it between breakfast and their weekly round of golf. Still, having a sibling's child giving birth gives me pause.
Last year Mom dies, the last of her generation, and this year Amanda gives birth to the first of the next generation. I will become a great-uncle, and our fate as the older generation will be sealed. All my nieces and nephews will have to step up and claim their status as emerging adults and I will continue to be bewildered by how many young celebrities I don't know and how much popular music I am totally unfamiliar with.
For now, I just want to kick back, get ready for the vacation, and enjoy our days away from the big city. I watch the news and hear about the drive-by gang shootings and high-speed chases that end in gunfire and small children killed by hit-and-run drivers and robberies and murders in fast-food franchises and serial rapists and I just want to get away from all those things. In a small town those things are occasional tragedies. In the big city they are repetitive fodder to punctuate the daily stream of commercials on TV.
Another shift in perspective in my brain pool: At the turn of the century, being a publication designer meant I had to move to a metropolis to follow my career goals. But printed publications are evaporating and the role of the web in publication is expanding day by day: Much better to exploit the fact that even small businesses soon will need to have an Internet presence and set up to provide design services for that than to mourn the passing of the good old days when everything went onto paper and could be tucked into your portfolio book. Now it's all digitized and tucked into your portfolio website for all the world to see.
When we get back from Eureka, we're also meeting with a contractor who comes highly recommended by a friend who works in the construction trades. So perhaps it will be time to move on the remodel. And perhaps it will be time to move on my first paid website. And perhaps things will move forward and all those thoughts caught in that eddy will flow forth and nourish all things in the immediate future.
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