Brinking

Photo by Just Add Light.

My youngest nephew, Will, is on the cusp of two years old—that adorably maddening tipping point between babydom and full-functioning Big Boy.  Sometimes he struggles to communicate his needs, at which point he defaults to a full-throated, full-fake cry; sometimes, he’s clearly and efficiently out-sentencing most reality show contestants.

And sometimes he switches from one to the other within no interval between the two.  Recently he was struggling to open a toy, and, seeing a facsimile of an Official Adult nearby in me, he wailed aloud.  I bent down to unfasten the latches for him. I might not be willing to endure labor, breastfeeding, and adolescence, but I can unlock the plastic stops on a Fisher-Price barn. Most of the time.

“Thank you, Aunt Beth,” he said with great dignity, and stuck his thumb in his mouth.

Should the child choose to launch a career as any kind of freelancer, he’s already been through the worst part of it, just as you and I have.  Will is brinking, first teetering towards the womb, then college.  And he’ll survive it, just as you and I have.

But since all most of us recall from that era is perhaps a few dim memory-flashes of nubby carpet or hard-soled shoes, we have to go through it all over again when we depart day jobs for life wholly on our own.  Our own terms, yes.  But also our own silence, our own accounting software, our own loneliness.

Launching a freelance career is like the first days of a new romance.  It’s scary, but the tumble is exuberating, freeing.  You don’t sleep.  Eating becomes secondary.  You tell everyone you meet:  “I met a great career.”  And on the other side of successfully  making the freelance switch is that glorious cocktail of security and freedom.  But that middle part…

That middle part…

That muddy ground, when you’re hanging by your fingertips to Juliet’s balcony, the wisps of romantic individualism still curling about your ears.  At the same time, the first contracts are drying up, the IRS wants a projection for next year, the COBRA policy is about to expire.  Have you made it, or have you not?

It’s hard to tell, here in the middle, here in the terrible twos.  Days aren’t roller coasters; hours are.  You give in, you’re a professional now.  You negotiate a contract, you have no idea what to charge.  Last week, even though I’ve commanded a dollar a word, I was paid in three bottles of wine and a free hotel room.  (Don’t ask.)

The era of building a freelance career, caught between launching and sailing, involves a great deal of frantic paddling, broken only by occasional panic attacks and constant bank-balance checking.  And wailing, and complete sentences.

And it’s okay.  We might need someone else to help us fumble the latches open, but there’s a whole new life creaking open.

From the perilous Beltway edge of Washington, D.C., Mary Beth Ellis runs BlondeChampagne and MaryBethEllis.today.com.  Her first book, “Drink to the Lasses,” was published in 2006.