On the Balls of Our A$$ets

Arrivederci!  After much deliberation, consternation, and clearing up a few misunderstandings, I decided to attend the  writing conference  in Italy that I wrote about back in April. (It turned out there were rooms still available at the hotel where the workshop is being held, and there will be group transportation from Rome to Recanati, so I can stop worrying about pitching a tent on a hillside or ending up in Sicily.)  I've taken on a lot of additional freelance work to avoid having to start a GoFundMe campaign (but thank you, Rose, for supporting that idea!), which is why it's taken me a while to write this post. Plus, maybe it's that notorious old spoilsport known as "mom guilt," but it feels wildly self-indulgent to leave the country during the summer and jet off in an attempt to recapture the kind of creativity that goes beyond trying a new taco recipe.  When I tell people I'm going, I hear that imaginary record scratch, like, "Wait, r

As I mentioned in my last post , sometimes you can meet some real losers through the Internet. (I'm sure  this comes as no revelation to anyone who's tried online dating.) B ut, on the flip side, every once in a while an interesting opportunity arrives in your inbox via cyberspace. A few weeks ago, I was contacted by the assistant to Kristin  Hiemstra, M.Ed, ELI-MP, founder and president of The Art of Potential ,  about participating in an upcoming Career Seekers Summit  she's hosting. Much like when  Elise Runde Voss, chief executive officer of  UpScored  called me a "thought leader" and  asked me to write about  the  game-changing  career platform she'd developed, I once again experienced a looking-over-each-shoulder "Who, me?" moment.  Of course, I enjoy writing career features for The Muse  and hope that some of the hard-won wisdom I've acquired after losing two jobs within four years helps others. Yet , especially after pon