Matching Funds and One Heckuva Pep Talk

well, here we are again

Oh, hi, there! No, no reason at all for this GIF, we are having a perfectly lovely and normal week here in the good ol’ US of A, how about you? 

Ahahahahahahayeah, we wish. Our Supreme Court has been handing down bad decision after bad decision as this year’s term draws to a close, none anticipated with greater dread, disgust, and fury than this morning’s decision overturning Roe v. Wade. We knew this was coming, it was not a surprise in any way, but it turns out that the horror of horrifying outcomes isn’t dampened by bracing for it. 

So what are we gonna do about it? Well, as Dame Karen rightly pointed out during our morning text screaming session, there are systems already in place to fight this. People have always been fighting the awful stuff in this world. Funny how the awfulness-imposers are nearly always the ones with the most resources and the least to lose. 

We are going to do the one concrete thing we can today, providing matching donations to abortion funds. We have $450 in our matching donation pool, and all you need to do is send us a copy or screenshot of your receipt (w/financial details crossed out, of course). We’ll be donating to the National Network of Abortion Funds, and we encourage you to do the same, to donate to a specific fund in the state of your choice, to a practical support organization you like the look of, or to purchase items off of a fund’s wishlist. We’re seeing a lot of energy around the idea of a new underground railroad and the thing is, that infrastructure already exists, and supporting and/or signal-boosting it is a very fine choice!

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GET READY TO BE PEP-TALKED!!! 

This shark knows what’s up! And has such ferocious dentition that I would not recommend disagreeing!

Recently, Dame Karen was having a real garbagey couple of weeks, career-wise, and it was all backing up on her. Freelance life is very liberating, and gives us tons of flexibility, but sometimes flexibility is a synonym for precarity. And when you’re in a line of work that amounts to asking editors if you could pretty please write some good words for them in exchange for less money than is ideal, a string of bad days can turn into bad weeks can turn into a seriously bad emotional spiral. In short, Dame Karen needed a substantive pep talk. The window for a quick confidence boost had closed, and a calming manatee was not going to cut it in this case.

The calming manatee is right! But she may not always be sufficient. 

So Dame Sophie rolled up her little Breton sleeves and furnished the following. Like all of us, it’s incomplete, it’s messy, it’s a work in progress. But Dame Karen liked it so much that she suggested we publish it for this week’s issue, and as serendipity would have it, it’s pretty timely. We both hope it’s helpful for you in some way, and invite friendly additions in the comments. 

Ok! First of all! You feel like garbage! That is OK! Wallow as needed! Be aware that ALL feelings pass and the only way out is through! This may take some time, so please try to be patient with your delicate self!

I’d say that a very much-hoped-for professional thing going kaflooey is something that makes us feel a low-grade type of grief! Are you actively grieving something much bigger than the professional thing? Quite possibly! In fact, things being what they are, almost certainly!

As we know, grief is a tricky little jerk who simply loooooves doubling back and popping in for an extra little unannounced visit at the drop of a hat. No manners, raised in a barn, etc. That guy can go jump in the lake!

Again, we can’t stop grief from dropping in unexpectedly (or even fully expectedly). The best we can do most days is recognize it for what it is, remind ourselves that it will pass, on its own terrible timeline, and also remind ourselves that we are in fact ok (as it happens, both of us are better than ok, we are brilliant cruelty-free diamonds, but not everyone can handle all that sparkle, so we keep that a little bit quiet lest we blind anyone, we are not monsters).

Now, I love a concrete task, and I love lateral productivity, they are to me as a makeover is to Cher Horowitz, allowing me to feel some measure of control in a world that is *gestures broadly* so! Here are some ideas, which you should feel free to ignore and/or use as a jumping-off point for your own short-term jerkbrain-defusing techniques & ideas:

1. What the hell is in that tote (backpack, suitcase, opaque box, cabinet, long-neglected corner of the room)? Take a peek & categorize it, no more! More is not required! All you need is an awareness of what it is, so it’s not a shame-inducing misery in your supposed living room, not that I have one single instance of experience with this, nosireebob! Once you know what it is, slap a little note on there with a brief label that will make sense to you. That’s it! Should you feel later that you can do something further with that now-labeled tote to make it work better for you, great, revisit it then.

1. An occasion to be gorgeous (whatever that means for you): if you’re a makeup person, do a full face or just a smokey eye. Your body, your business! I’m fond of putting on a favorite outfit or piece of jewelry that makes me feel like hot stuff. The feeling you’re going for is (and this is how I describe it for me, you do you, just make sure you are validating the hell out of yourself) YES this perfectly acceptable visage of mine is lighting up the whole neighborhood!! Even if I’m staying inside! Doesn’t matter! People everywhere within a ½-mile radius are feeling great and they don’t even know why! That’s how powerful you are at your best!

1. For Dame Karen and other creatives in particular, review your clips and freshen up/add to what you have posted on your site. Reviewing older clips can remind you of a follow-up idea you’d like to pursue, or of an editor you liked working with, or a wholly new thing. You did work that another person wanted to put in front of the eyeballs of lots of other people! Do you know how few people even bother to try? They head their own wonderful selves off at the pass for any number of reasons, but you did not! You now have something concrete to show for it! 

1. One I struggle with mightily & probably should move to long-term stuff: truly, who cares? I don’t mean this with regard to your intrinsic worth and good ideas, which have value regardless of what any editor thinks, I mean it in terms of…see it’s hard for me to frame it! It’s nebulous and yet so sharp! Gold stars, honor roll, cum laude, zillions of bylines, what have you: external validation, I guess is what it is. We are SO trained to want it, SO talented at getting it, SO let down when that good feeling passes. It is a truly vicious cycle. And yeah, of course we should be building those internal/intrinsic motivation & validation muscles, but that isn’t going to help you in the next 30 minutes, is it? You know what can help you right now, though? Yelling as loud as you want and are able, WHO GIVES A SHIT???? It’s a small step, but a step nonetheless. Also works as a reminder that while schmancy bylines [or substitute your own longed-for mark of accomplishment here] are very nice to have, neither getting them nor not getting them is not what matters in the scheme of things. The good feelings they generate fade just as surely as the garbage feelings of NOT getting them.

1. Tell someone. Tell more than one someone. Tell me, too!! The burdens we try to shoulder alone are the weightiest, and even at our grouchiest, saddest, most forlorn and miserable, we are still lovable and loved. Managing the unmanageable is something we do all the time, but doing so alone is what’s really impossible. Give yourself some damn grace, and please don’t run down my wonderful, talented, insightful, hilarious, loving friend Karen in the process, I simply won’t have it.

Let’s hear it for emotional porousness! 

All of my thoughts above are, of course, not original. Some of the insights I’ve drawn on the most recently include KC Davis’s Struggle Care. Her super-readable book How To Keep House While Drowning has been especially influential for me recently, and though it’s all about managing your living spaces so they’re more functional for you, I’ve found a lot of it is helpful in other areas of my life, as well. Mary Oliver is almost always right, too; joy is not meant to be a crumb. [Hi, it’s Karen. One time I got a tarot reading and the reader was like “Oh, you’re a fucking mess,” basically, which I appreciated because just get to the point and tell me things, you know? Don’t dick around and be airy and gentle about it, please, I can’t bear it. They recommended Unfuck Your Brain by Faith G. Harper and it’s great, as is the rest of Harper’s Unfuck series. Do NOT accidentally start reading the Unfuck Yourself series by some guy named Gary. It’s not what you’re looking for, probably.]

Two Bossy Dames is brought to you by:

• This adorable portrait of our pal Judith engaged in some hijinks with…*squints at caption* some guy named Holofernes¹

• Oh, look, here they are again!²

• And, huh, wow, she really is going for it here. Good stuff, good stuff! Isn’t art just the keenest? ³

1. Caravaggio’s Judith Beheading Holofernes

2. Valentin de Boulogne’s Judith and Holofernes

3. Artemisia Gentileschi’s Judith Slaying Holofernes