I’ve been soooooooo busy with work! A textbook that I’ve been working on for a long, long time is now it the final stages. I’m reviewing page proofs now and the schedule is very aggressive. I’ll be burning the midnight oil up to November 23. Trouble is, I’m tired. The last full day off I had was October 4. I’m just not as good at working late into the night as I used to be. Hello, 37.

It’s OK, though, because I have a vacation coming. We’ll be going to Capitola over Thanksgiving and I’m working really hard now in the hopes that I won’t have to take any work along with me. Working this hard now will turn out to be an investment in my sanity later. This is the plan, anyway.

A new Big Project is starting up for a Big Publisher and it’s one I’ll be working on through May of 2010. I have yet to figure out what I’ll be doing exactly, but I’m glad to have it. I’ll be working on the creation of a web-based product instead of a book. I’m excited to have the opportunity to expand my skills!

I recently finished a computer book edit, which was a great book and a good project, except for the lesson it taught me about Time vs. Fee. I choose to feel grateful for the learning opportunity.

On deck for today is this motto: “Work like crazy!” I am hoping someday soon the day’s motto will be “Play like crazy!”

Words. Words. Words. I’m up to my eyeballs in words: editing, writing, note-taking, developing. New projects are on the horizon. Current projects are clamoring for attention, competing with each other to get a piece of me.

It’s late and I’m so very tired. It was a wordy day, so I’ll share only a photograph.

Remember those three books about the Middle East I’ve been copyediting lately? Well, I finished Lebanon on Friday, just in the nick of time to make it to NoNo’s graduation. 

Today, I received an offer to work on another title from the same publisher. I wrote back and asked for more money. I thanked the editor for the project offer and explained I do have time in my schedule and would like to take it on. I then told her my normal hourly rate, reminded her of my excellent and reliable service, experience, and timeliness, and said I hoped I could continue taking on their projects on a regular basis. I took a gamble in asking for this raise. I don’t exactly have offers of work coming out my ears right now. My “busy season” hasn’t started yet and I have big ol’ bills to pay.

Here’s hoping my gamble pays off.

Last month this happened: http://sarabellae.livejournal.com/155788.html.

Last week, it happened again. Another check arrived for a copyeditor named Sara Wilson. This one for $713.

“Attention Accounts Payable:

“I am returning a check made out to Sara Wilson for Invoice 12308. This check is intended for Sara Wilson in Ohio. You have two Sara Wilsons, both copyeditors, in your computer system. Please endeavor to choose the correct Sara Wilson when issuing payment. This is the second check intended for the Ohio Sara Wilson that I have received. I would appreciate it if you would make all of your staff aware of this confusing issue of two editors having the same name. I am sure all of your freelancers appreciate prompt payment.”

I would like to say that if I receive a third check made out to me for editing work that I did not do, I would cash it—because that would be funny and bold and a take-no-prisoners thing to say, but it would be a lie. I don’t think I could do that, no matter how much having an extra $713 in my bank account would help. And it would.

I guess I did a good job on Syria because today I was offered a project copyediting Israel, 2e from the same children’s publisher. Maybe after this one I’ll tell them what my hourly rate really is. In the meantime, they’re getting good value for their measly money.

I have a couple of strategy guides going: one full-size guide that’s almost done and another tiny hint book. I’m hoping another one to three guides will come my way soon.

The chapter on pet massage that I was told to research and write has been placed on hold. It seems the publisher for that textbook isn’t actually sure it wants to include that content. Now I’m supposed to do market research instead of writing research. Thanks for yanking my hours back, folks.

Related to work worries are my summertime worries, which have awakened rather early this year. Looking ahead just a hop, skip, and jump from now reveals twelve yawning, empty weeks until school starts again. Although summer has always been my favorite time of year, I now understand why my mother dreaded it, and why every time the words “I’m bored” were mentioned in her house, she went insane with rage. 

This summer I’ll have part-time childcare for Lucas and Asher. Today I registered Lucas for a weeklong, half-day camp at the Effie Yeaw Nature Center. The program is for first and second graders and  it’s called “Signs Along the Trail.” He’ll get to comb the trails near the American River with the group looking for evidence of animal activity, use binoculars, make notes, play games, do crafts, and meet some Nature Center animals.

I’ve recently found out that several of Lucas’s classmates will be doing a Waldorf-oriented Summer Art Camp and I’m wondering if we can swing that, too. It’s not cheap. Lucas is quite the artist nowadays and enjoys working with crayons, charcoal, beeswax, watercolors and other paints, and even pastels. I think he would really like this camp.

There will probably be more swimming lessons too.

But all this still leaves me with the challenge of working while caring for Asher nearly full-time. As he gets older and more mobile (meaning into more stuff), it gets harder and harder to accomplish anything during the day. I’m often wiped out by 8:30 p.m. and find it challenging to work at night, too.

All this sounds complainy—but today I’m really in a decent mood. I’m glad to have the new project. I love the fact that when I tell the Universe I need more work, something usually arrives in my lap. Hopefully my childcare challenges will resolve themselves in the same manner. 

So, thank you, Universe. And if you could figure a way for me to earn a decent living and still wrangle my kiddos, I’d really appreciate it.

I’ve just finished a small copyediting project about Syria. It was interesting and thankfully short. Arabic names are a bitch; transliteration produces all manner of variant spellings. I did not make a ton of money on the book and worked harder on it than I’ve worked on most projects in the last … um … six months or so, but as my freelance work has been spotty over the last several months, I’m grateful to have had the project. Now I am more convinced than ever that peace in that region of the globe is hopeless, although that was not the message of the book. 

I’m experiencing a lot of internal conflict over work and what I’m supposed to be doing with my time. On the one hand, I have a voracious appetite for work. I like working. I find it stimulating and rewarding. I like concentrating and solving problems, unraveling knots of words into a single, easy-to-follow thread. I like challenging myself and learning new things, which is truly the beauty of the work I do: Every project is different. There is always something to learn. And getting paid to work on books that I wouldn’t normally pick up to read for pleasure has the added bonus of forcing me to learn about things I’m not necessarily naturally inclined to learn about. It broadens my horizons, so to speak. Whenever I speak to other freelancer friends, I’m impressed by what they are doing, by how many clients they have, by how much hustling, networking, and marketing they do, by how much they work/earn (although direct conversation about money is rare). I’m impressed by their drive and ambition and success. I yearn for the same. I yearn to do more, earn more, learn more, be more. My immediate impulse at this moment is to email all my clients and ask for more work.

And yet …

I’m equally motivated by the needs of my family. I have two small people who can’t get along five minutes without me (or so it often seems). I have thoroughly enjoyed Asher’s babyhood thus far. Sometimes I get to take naps with him. We look at books together. We listen to music. In the afternoons when Lucas is home and not at the babysitters’, we enjoy the outdoors, go to the library, visit my grandmother, take walks, do art projects. These things are fun and fulfilling. I know that my children will grow up quickly. I am not willing to miss these early years. I think they do best when they are with me, and I’m grateful to have a supportive (literally and figuratively) husband and a profession that allows me so much flexibility to be with my kids. I also know that I would be a miserable wreck of a mother if I had to ship my children off to daycare full-time. I wussed out at the prospect of part-time daycare back in 2003 and have never looked back since. Some days I am able to slow down my brain and watch the butterflies drift across the yard. Some days I can take great pleasure in washing the dishes by hand with Lucas. I try to cultivate patience and peace by watching good things grow—vegetables, messes, and boys. They grow slowly. I am unable (and unwilling) to speed up the time. And so, my world turns slowly. 

Sometimes that slowness—the drowzy and dizzying days of taking care of children—is a welcome balm. And sometimes it makes me grit my teeth and feel corralled.

There is a metaphor about marriage that is a better metaphor for raising children. Ian and I have “hitched” ourselves to a cart full of precious cargo. We did it on purpose. We must ensure the cargo’s safe delivery to (hopefully) a happy and productive adulthood. We must choose our path carefully and not deviate from it randomly or without consideration. We must go slowly and steadily so as not to jostle or damage the cargo, or bounce it out and leave it by the wayside. We must make frequent rest stops and potty breaks. And although we might wish to run off together without the cart and cargo, we basically can’t—at least not until the cargo gets much farther down the path, and then only for a short break. And the cart won’t travel nearly so well with only one of us pulling, so we are hitched. It’s a good kind of hitched.

*Sigh*

Too busy to write lately, I suppose. Actually, I think I’m stuck on something I want to write about, but here’s a brief recap of some recent stuff.

* I finally have some editing work and a deadline coming this Wednesday. One project is a copyedit for a book on Syria for the 6th-12th grade market. It’s got me hoppin’ a bit and doesn’t pay well, but hey. I took it. It’s been good dusting off my brain a bit. Arabic naming conventions are puzzling—either that or my two authors are wildly inconsistent.

* Had a crisis last Monday related to being sick. I have a big post about that brewing, but suffice it to say it has a happy ending. I have learned a lot recently.

* Lucas is back in school, Thank God! He seems to be all better now. We’re starting the probiotics.

* Despite being busy with my projects and working a fair piece of it, I’ve had a terrific weekend. Yesterday we got to meet up and picnic with sundayhangover, foseelovechild, and grlfury. I ate strawberries and bits of apple (heaven!) and drank champagne. The weather was perfect both yesterday and today. Today, we were invited to go kayaking with my brother and his girlfriend, Boo. We are so getting into kayaking as soon as the boys are a tad bit older. Actually, Lucas is ready now. Asher may have to stay home for a while yet. My dad came out to the lake with us and stayed with Asher on shore so the rest of us could go paddling under the Folsom Rainbow bridge. It was so cool and beautiful on the water. I always feel so much better about life when I can get out under the sky, breathe deeply, and remember that my problems are small in comparison with the great, big, beautiful world.

* My hubby is super handy! He fixed a switch and two outdoor light boxes on our house that have never worked. He installed two new fixtures and they’re really pretty. We have more to put up that will all match and our backyard patio will be ready for summer nights. (Now we must get the hot tub fixed!)

Work at the magazine this week went well. I was brave and gracious. I talked to all my (ex-) coworkers about the changes at the magazine and my services as proofreader being discontinued. At least to my face everyone was sorry about it and regretful. The editor promises me that I’m the one they’ll call back when the economics are better. She referred to having me working on the magazine a “luxury.” Probably what will happen is that the in-house people will be asked to work more and harder. An editorial employee who is my friend also got cut: She still has a job, but they demoted her to receptionist (and canned the receptionist they had) and cut my friend’s pay. A few other people in different departments were affected (i.e., let go). They have also cut their freelance budget by what sounds to me like a big number, but given that I have no idea what the budget was or what it is now, it’s hard for me to say.

So, we’ll see. I guess they gotta do what they gotta do to stay healthy and weather the economic changes in the region. I must say though, it’s kind of ironic (correct word choice?) that I consistently read about all the wonderful, progressive, exciting things that are happening in this town in the pages of this magazine, which is presently reacting to an economic downturn. Anyway, Monday will be my last day there.

I’ve come to find the silver lining in this change: It’s kinda hard on Asher to have me leave him with a sitter or grandma for 3 to 4 days in a row, when the rest of the month he’s with me constantly. He has survived, of course, but by Friday evening, it was clear that he wanted and needed some mama time. Now I won’t have to do that anymore. I will still need babysitting, but I can arrange it on my own terms and hopefully establish a more consistent rhythm for him—one that he can actually get used to—that doesn’t have 27 days between sets of sitter days. As he is coming into The Great Separation Anxiety Stage, this will be easier on him.

Last Thursday, my father turned 62. That is hard to believe. In my mind, he is still 40. He probably will always be that age in my mind. A friend recently lost her father to cancer. He was older than my dad is—a doctor who practiced medicine up until his end. I can see how hard losing her last parent has been on her. Her plight has inspired some morbid thoughts.

I am thoroughly enjoying the drawing classes that Ian and I are taking on Thursday nights. The teacher is teaching in a loose, intuitive way, which sometimes works and sometimes doesn’t. But the true gift of the class is that we 1) leave our home and kids and assorted real-life distractions, 2) go to a studio/gallery where we are surrounded by art and things to draw, and 3) there are two and a half glorious hours with nothing else to do except drink tea. We are hoping to continue the classes for the next couple of months, or for as long as our babysitters are willing to watch our kidlings. Ian has really caught the bug. He’s been practicing at home, which is wonderful to see because while he’s drawing, he’s not worrying. I love this guy so much. I hate to see him worried. It has been very good for us to have this time together and share this artistic pursuit. I can’t wait to paint!

My brother and his girlfriend, Courtney, recently got back from a vacation in Mexico. It sounds like they had a super time. I think this is Jonathan’s first serious vacation in years. I’m happy for them both. I just love seeing them together and it is my sincerest hope that they continue to make each other happy.

We spent a lovely couple of hours with friends last night. It was refreshing and made me so happy to see them.