Finding Direction: The Wind Vane Chronicles

When I was in my mid 30s, I was a newspaper journalist.  Actually, I was Community Editor for the Picayune Item, the newspaper here in Picayune where Tom is now publisher.

At that time he was Advertising Director, a position he held for many years.  I worked over in the newsroom side of the building.  I've written about this before, but we reporters and editors felt we were far superior to the crass advertising reps.  We were the purists while their bottom line was money.

Then, one day Tom let me know (all of us, actually) that it was their revenue they brought in that paid our salaries.  That certainly toned us down a tad.  More than a tad.  We were immediately quieted.

My three kids were growing up then, so I never lacked for anything to write about in my weekly personal column.  They were full of stories waiting to be told.  Funny things, comical even, adventurous things, academic successes - they were definitely the stuff that good writing is made from and I took full advantage.

It all went to their heads, though.  One finally refused to talk with me any more unless I paid for the conversation because he knew it would end up in the newspaper.  He was right.  It always did.

I miss those days.  A lot.  

I mean, I'm glad to have my kids grown and lots of grandkids, but the days of having built in stories are long gone.  It makes me rather sad.

Last night my daughter, Rebecca, called me to ask me for some editing help with a creative writing project she was doing for her work.  She is the Assistant Regional Marketing Manager for a company that sells icing wholesale to grocery stores such as HEB and Albertson's (for those of you who live in Texas or the south) all across the nation.

She was putting together pictures and copy about new cakes that Albertson's was going to be selling in their stores.  Her work would be used in advertising and in store displays.  One of the cakes was a Snickers cake, and, boy, did it look delicious, and I'm not even a cake lover.  But I love Snickers and this cake looked yummy.

She called me about helping her edit the copy and then emailed it to me to read and work on.  She sent pictures along with her copy to help me visualize the cakes she was writing about.  We spent the whole evening talking on the phone back and forth and emailing back and forth and conversing and it was lots of fun.

Tom is away on a trip and I was sitting here bored with nothing to do to keep me busy through the long evening and helping her was the perfect antidote.  When I checked my email this morning I found that she had emailed me 12 times over the evening and I saved the one of the finished product - her page she was working on with all of my edits in it.  She used every one I suggested.

It's nice to know I haven't lost my touch.  I just wish I could find some kind of part time, work from home, editing job.  I love to write and even more I love to edit and I know I'm good at it.  

But in the meantime, I'll help Rebecca whenever I can and continue to be a mom.  Maybe not in the way of days gone by, but still in good ways.

Maybe I still have things to write about after all.  After all, I still have kids and they are still entertaining.  I hope that always continues to be so, and I think it will.

Thank God for letting me be a mom!

Dee

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