Midnight Goddess

I spend way too much time playing WoW. For me, it’s fun, exciting and a way for me to relax and get away from a dull existence. But I think I take it far too seriously to be considered just a casual WoW gamer. I’m not a freak like some people. There’s a guy out there wiht 35+ separate accounts on WoW! No, not 35+ separate characters. 35+ accounts! That could mean upwards of 350+ characters! Now that’s insane. I won’t get that far. There will probably be 2 separate accounts… one for me and one for Memphis. I’m sure he’ll love playing when he can better understand the game. It’ll be fun going on quests with him ;).

Anyway, I had come to the harsh realization that I can’t depend on a steady income from selling graphics to the Myspace site owners community. Especially when a good portion of my “competitors” are high school kids that don’t have any real financial responsibilities. They have Mom and Dad that support them. They sell their graphics for pennies. I will not stoop to that level and sell myself short. It’s absolutely degrading and I won’t have that. I have a family to take care of.

So I told Marty a few days ago that I was going to contact David at a webmaster forum that I used to frequent that I want him to close down my shop. I only made one sale there. There is a requirement that I have to produce 2 new packs per month to keep my shop open. And I just can’t do that when I can’t make enough money to warrrant creating new packs.

But even though I made the conscious decision to let go of the Myspace community as a way to make money, I still felt butt hurt and downright bitchy that night when I finally logged into the forum and got an email from Anne stating when I last posted a pack, when I last made any sort of post in the forum, and reminding me of the rules. She also said that I was given until Oct. 26 to notify the admins of my decision or the store will be closed. Lo and behold, when I checked the members shop, my shop was no where to be found. I felt like I was stabbed. I was absolutely angry. I didn’t respond to Anne’s email. Instead, I removed links to both forums where I used to sell my graphics. I don’t need them.

My plan to begin a legit business from home has been a dream I’ve had for almost a decade. It has been a concrete plan ever since I had Memphis, and even more so now that Jasmine is here. I am going to be a stay at home mom but I need to make a steady income from home to help Marty and our family. I’ve thought long and hard about what I want to do and over the decade, I’ve had some ideas. One of them I spent almost 8 years trying to make money. I made a little bit but not enough to depend on. I did the eBay thing and made some money but again, not enough. I’ve bought and read all kinds of ebooks on how to make money from home. I’m one of those suckers that keeps falling for the how to make a shitload of money from home trap. I guess I thoroughly enjoy reading about the people who make money online, whether it’s true or not. I also like seeing the “proof” of income generated, even if it’s Photoshopped.

I spent a lot of time over a long period finetuning my plan of action. I even went so far as typing it up and putting it in paper protectors inside a binder that I can look at. Yes, that’s my organizational skills at work. My organizing habit keeps me sane, calm, relaxed, and in control of at least some aspects of my life.

I took a small step towards financial independence by signing up for a premium shop at Cafepress. I’m sure most people can’t see that as a step towards financial independence. But to me, it is. I don’t have personal concrete proof that I’ll make money from having a Cafepress shop. But I know there are a lot of regular people who are successful with their stores. It’s not a huge risk to take. After the 2 week trial, it’ll be about $7 a month to maintain the shop. Cafepress will deduct the $7 first from whatever I make. And if that does’t cover the cost, they will then deduct it from my credit card. Cheesy easy.

I took a look at some of the products being sold in the Cafepress marketplace. Even though there are some really nice, intricate designs, for the most part it seems that the average, simple designs are also being sold. That calms my nerves a bit. There’s a shop that sells really cute, but very simple stick figure drawings on products. Cafepress seems to allow shopkeepers the abililty to sell products that are even racy, dirty, and sarcastic. I should be able to fit right in. Now all I need to do is get over my “creative block” and start drawing! I found a site by a guy named Marty who wrote a script that allows you to implement your Cafepress shop into your site and make it look like it’s 100% part of your site. And it cost about $20, right up my alley.

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in my life. I have bits and pieces of that but I’m not completely content. It’s all in my mind and my mind is fucking with me. So many negative thoughts and other stuff that I’m letting get the best of me. I hate it, absolutely hate it. I need peace and happiness and no one can give that to me. I have to allow myself to be happy and at peace but I’m a perpetual prisoner of my own mind. The stress, the anger, the frustration, the debt, the bills… I’m drowning in all of that.

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Absolutely blows. I’ve been PMSing like crazy for the past week and a 1/2 so not only was I suffering but the rest of my family was suffering as well. I’ve been getting furiously mad at everyone for every thing, big and small. My patience was almost nonexistent. Sometimes I believe that I’m much better off having my period because my emotions aren’t out of whack. I’m not mood swinging and my body doesn’t hurt like hell.

Not only that but the economy has gone to complete shit. Normally, I don’t let it bother me because I can’t control it. I have a better chance of controlling our family’s economy. But the economy is seriously effecting my mom and Marty’s parents. His parents are stressing out hardcore. They’re among many people in this nation that are suffering from the stock market tanking like hell everyday.

Me and Marty have been fighting a lot the past 2 weeks. It’s been hard. The core of all of our fighting is mainly the lack of money. We always agreed that if we didn’t have money issues, our marriage would be just about perfect. It really would be. Can’t wait to win millions from the Mega Millions lottery.

Anyway, things were said between us that were not nice, downright mean. There was a lot of shouting and insulting.

Last week, me and the kids were at the neighborhood WaMu bank several times. Master Plumbing wrote Marty 2 separate business checks but they were addressed to Pro West Coast Services. So I had to go to the bank to deposit the checks for him. What a monstrous fiasco that started. Apparently, the bank had closed our business account the day before without our knowledge or consent due to the fact that there were no large deposits to the account since March. So I had to frantically search our apartment for the fictious business name statement which I found in a binder. Then I had to go back with it to the bank so that they would open a new business account. They refused to reopen the original account. That made us look like new business account owners which in essence made them hold our funds for 2 business days. Bullshit. We had to pay the fuckin rent! And I needed the funds in the account.

Over a week and many frustrating trips to the bank later, I managed to get the funds I needed into our personal account and gave Stephanie, our apartment complex manager, a bank certified check. Luckily she didn’t ding us for $50 for the check being late.

I really need to be making steady money. It’s that simple. But how to do that remains the frustrating question.

I talked to my aunt Cris last Friday. She told me that my aunt Josie is not cancer-free. Unfortunately, it spread through her body and she has at most 6 years to live. Aunt Cris reminded me to call Mom and I promised her I would. She told me that her and Donnelle are going to the Philippines for 3 weeks on Nov. 3. So they were inviting the whole family over to their house on the 2nd for a final get together before they leave. It would also be a good time for them to give Memphis his belated birthday gift. He’ll like that.

I called Mom yesterday and talked to her for about 45 minutes. We talked about my aunt Josie and how how it’s spooked Mom into going to the doctor get thoroughly checked out. She said she hasn’t been to the doctor for a decade! She’s going to be fasting on Sunday and then going in on Monday to get on the treadmill and getting bloodwork done. So she’s definitely not going to be able to watch the kids on my birthday that day. Oh well. They’ll see her another time.

We also talked about how a friend of Mom’s from Ian’s swim class is going through a bad time because last Sunday she found out that her husband got killed while riding his bike at night on a busy street in Gilroy. It was a complete shock, even for me. It just goes to show that you never when your time is up. It made me realize that I shouldn’t spend so much time being angry, frustrated, and stressed out. I need to spend more time being happy and grateful for what we have and our good health. Me and Mom talked at length about that. She told me that Nelson’s been stressed out lately because they might have to get rid of their once million dollar home and move into an apartment. She kept telling him that it’s ok, that they don’t need to have big house. As long as they have a place to live, food to eat, and good health, they’re ok. But he’s still stressing out.

It’s been a bad time for everyone lately.

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And I don’t know what I’m doing with myself or my life. I’m a married stay-at-home mom to two beautiful kids. What are my notable successes in the past decade? Raising two great kids and being married for nearly 8 years. Yes, those are my greatest successes.

Other than that? That’s about as far as it goes. And I’m thoroughly disappointed in myself. In fact, I’ve unfortunately slipped into the deep, nasty, and ultra depressing recesses of my mind. I hate that…. absolutely hate it with a passion. What is my passion in life? Other than being a faithful wife and doting mother? I love computers, the internet and technology. I love making graphics. I love the thought of making good money from home on the computer. Even though I’ve made some money that way, it’s not a dream that has come true yet. So what is my passion? I don’t quite know yet.

I seriously need to get out of this fucked up rut. I really do.

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Here’s a story that I received in my email this morning. It’s called Love and Loss:

I was lucky. I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz and I started Apple in my parents garage when I was 20. We worked hard, and in 10 years Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2 billion company with over 4000 employees. We had just released our finest creation - the Macintosh - a year earlier, and I had just turned 30. And then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you started?

Well, as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me, and for the first year or so things went well. But then our visions of the future began to diverge and eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our Board of Directors sided with him. So at 30 I was out. And very publicly out. What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating.

I really didn’t know what to do for a few months. I felt that I had let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down - that I had dropped the baton as it was being passed to me. I met with David Packard and Bob Noyce and tried to apologize for screwing up so badly. I was a very public failure, and I thought about running away from the valley. But something slowly began to dawn on me - I still loved what I did. The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. I had been rejected, but I was still in love. And so I decided to start over.

I didn’t see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.

During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife. Pixar went on to create the worlds first computer animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world. In a remarkable turn of events, Apple bought NeXT.

I returned to Apple, and the technology we developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apple’s current renaissance. And Laurene and I have a wonderful family together.

I’m pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn’t been fired from Apple.It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don’t lose faith. I’m convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You’ve got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers.

Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking.

Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don’t settle.

Steve Jobs

Steve Jobs gave this as his second story of his Commencement Address at Stanford University on June 12, 2005.

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