The old saying is true. You think you're free, and something always pulls you back in. It's like there are no ex-Marines, no ex-KGB, no ex-Mobsters. You can pretend that you walk away, but you're never going to truly escape. Now, while there is nothing in my history quite as dramatic as all of those career paths, I definitely have found myself equally tied to the things I have done habitually. I thought last week I had been entirely clear that the PR job was overwhelming me and when I said "find someone else" they took me seriously. Today I found the person who sort of wants to step up to the job may only want part of it, and there I was, letting the words fall out of my mouth, "I can keep doing the newsletter if (that other person) wants to do all the rest." I needed to cut it cleanly, when I happily turned my back on running for a second term as a military spouses club president, in order to save my health. After the elections, I remember saying out loud to the president-elect, "It'll be all yours now. No takebacks."
Twenty-plus years ago, when my friend and I tried to make a living designing and sewing costumes, we put in ludicrously long hours in our home shop. I was there in her converted garage more than 50 hours a week, every week, sewing until my body ached. (Luckily, I was renting my partner's basement apartment at the time, so I didn't have to try to find childcare for my toddlers, which would have absolutely bankrupted me while the money was only trickling in. The girls just played near us while we worked.) The small business startup experiment ended for me with the biggest case of burnout I ever experienced, and I had more than my share of run-ins with that particular problem. Once we split up the business, when Mr S-P joined the military and we moved to the east coast for the first time, I stopped sewing entirely for years. I had to be pushed by guilt to make Halloween costumes for the girls. It was at least 10 years before I was able to sew for fun again, and by then I'd dealt with years of ribbing from the Mr for the number of stuffed-to-the-gills boxes of fabrics we had moved to different duty stations, unopened.
I'm slowly starting to sew for other people again. Two and a half years ago, I made a cosplay coat for my younger daughter that was absolutely perfect, if I say so myself. She sure liked it, and she received plenty of compliments from other cosplayers. Last year, I made my foster daughter's wedding dress, something that took long hours and serious attention to detail, especially the days and days of hand-stitching a lace bodice. A few months ago, I made a ceremonial robe for an old friend of mine, whose acquaintance I made through the business partner long before we decided to become professional costumers. And today, I met a new person, to whom my friend recommended me to make another one of these ceremonial costumes. We met at a fabric store, took dozens of measurements and sketched out exactly what it is she wants, which while serving the same function as the last, will look significantly different in every way. This is going to be the first time in years that I've actually accepted money for my artistic skills. I'm nervous, and I want to apply myself so that the final product is appealing and impressive. I swore twenty years ago I'd never do this professionally again, yet here I am, thinking seriously about spending my non-active real estate time sewing custom garments. I will have to see how well this goes, to know what steps I'll be willing to take from here, but even before I've put scissors to the sheet of fabric for the first time, this new customer is talking about future projects.
You think you're free, but you never really walk away from some things.
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