Interesting: a group for older women.

Yet both your listed encouragers were men.

There's a lesson there.

Perhaps you can begin to think about fostering humans rather than genders.

You are one multi-talented woman, ww staebler!
I am in awe of you.

Hush now, little fella. Hush.

Hmmm, CT:
Is it possible that men, as well as women, might benefit from, or be inspired by, what women think and have to say? But you have inspired me, for sure -- if we can get this going, I think we'll have to have some male employees and interns, yes? As well as welcoming comments from everyone, be they male, female, or other.

Wendy, your plan sounds amazing. Maybe you needed those two years to interpret it and polish it. Sounds like you're ready now, and I wish you well. I'll be one of those waiting patiently to see the results.

About your avatar: Is it you? Did you draw/paint it?

This post made my week - a reconfirmation that we can seize the day, and carve out our futures from thin air and the treasure of our inspiration. Great job, ww.

Looks like a great project wwstaebler.

As for your male employment opportunities, I would like to point that I am a pretty good bouncer, especially with the correct fork held in my left hand.

Full Disclosure: I still have this thing for the smell of mimeograph ink.

Ever since this post went up I've been thinking about my own dreams and how they have changed over the years. Things that were of importance to me in my younger years seem so trivial now.

Although I have an overwhelming need to be valued, and to avoid being "ordinary" I can't seem to get a bead on a specific "dream." I'm a bit conflicted, because I love my life, yet there is a vague undercurrent of restlessness floating just below the surface. I suspicion it has to do with the reality of my own mortality that us "older folks" have to face once we recognize that we are well past middle age. I am very conscience of the fact that the years are racing by, gaining speed, and that anything I hope to accomplish needs to be done sooner, rather than later.

I have no need to "provide for myself." I am very fortunate that has been done for me (although I have not had the satisfaction that accompanies being able to do it.) So I am left with hoping to leave some sort of "legacy," some evidence that I was here. Is raising decent children, and contributing to the development of my grandchildren enough? I don't know the answer to that yet.

Still:

You ask: "Is raising decent children, and contributing to the development of my grandchildren enough?"
Of course it is. How many people do it, effectively and positively?

But is there a professional itch you had that you have not yet scratched? 

I was a kid who dissembled books I liked and integrated the pages into my textbooks so I could read them in class. So I didn't get invited to help with production very often.

The gateway drug angle has occurred to me but why fool around with huffing handouts when you could build model airplanes. I figure my experience led me to an appreciation for a tiny tab of rosewater behind each ear.

Speaking of "using the right fork." Am I the only one who is blown away by those stunningly proper and beautiful indented paragraphs? I didn't think it was possible to do on a blog! Is this a first? How did you do it? I just posted a comment at another blog bemoaning the near death of the indented paragraph. I'm swooning just looking at those spaces.

Dusting off dreams... I'm going to think about that. Thanks for the post, ww.

To write, you just need to take a deep breath and start...writing. Really. And, btw, I think you've already done the hard part, writing on a blog in which what you say can unleash immediate response -- whether positive, negative or simply challenging. That takes courage and resilience.
You've already taken that step and proven your worth. What could be scarier, then, than what you've already done? Fiction? Poetry? Well, maybe, for different reasons. Can you talk about it?

I infer (from reading comments by and to you on the Hive and on Tom Manoff's blog) that you are an accomplished singer? Therefore, I would be fascinated to know, GftB, what other talents and dreams fell by the wayside? What is your Plan B?
PS-- re: inset paragraphs. This was a word document I wrote in 2007 before I discovered TPM. So yesterday I cut and pasted it into TPM's format and, voila, the indented paragraphs remained intact. Unfortunately, I still have not mastered inserting an image (drawing, photograph or stylized title block in color) so the indented paragraph will have to suffice, for now, as IT progress made. ;-)

It's enough if it's enough for you, Stilli. And what greater calling is there than putting your whole heart and soul into raising great children and nurturing grandchildren? They're top priorities for me, too.

We all strive for different things and sometimes they can overlap. I love being a mom and a nana, but I also love being a writer. I know other women who, at this late stage, think maybe they should have done something else with their lives, but I'm not convinced that, without a perceived outside pressure to do more, they ever would have thought there was something else for them.

They are who they are and they're good at it. And, most of the time, they're happy with their choice.

BTW...you did an admirable job at shifting the focus away form yourself and onto us...what are YOU going to do, girl?!

There is much wisdom in those words, Ramona, which is why I am so conflicted with the "women's movement."

At a time when I was perfectly happy with my life as a stay at home mom, I felt pressure to "do more" with my life. Staying home just wasn't considered "enough."

So I got out there and for 20 years pursued my "then" dream, which turned out to be both a curse and a blessing for my family. Now that I have come full circle, and am a stay at home gaga, I am finding myself questioning, once again, whether it is "enough," only this time it isn't coming from a movement, but from inside. I thought I had learned that lesson, but apparently I have not, otherwise I wouldn't be feeling this restlessness. The questions I'm asking myself are, "is this leftover from before, or is it new?" and "do I NEED this, or just want it?" and if it is just a "want," "will blogging take care of it, or do I actually need to TRY and get published?" Lots of questions, not many answers just yet.

I hear you, loud and clear. I stayed at home when my kids were young and only went to work as a secretary when they were in high school and beyond. When my daughter needed help with our grandson, I chose to stay at home with him rather than have him sent off to day care. Best thing I ever did! I had time at home to develop my writing skills and it didn't cost anything more than the cost of a pad of paper and a pen. I bought a used typewriter eventually and then later, when I made a little money at it, a word processor.

But the point is, I got to watch my grandson grow up and I got to work on what I loved to do, and neither love interfered with the other. It sounds like you're in a perfect position to do what you realize you love to do. All it will cost is as much time as you want to devote to it. It's an adventure. Do not be afraid!

You are contributing to my delinquency! Go get in line behind ww for when I decide whether to thank or smack! (But thanks for the kind words, anyway!) If nothing else this exercise was a nice ego stroke...I'm already composing my acknowledgment page. How's that for putting the cart ahead of the horse!? At least you have me laughing instead of peeing my pants!

I think I have to pick one and zero in on it, ww, as you did. The magical component of your account was how you pieced out this project one component at a time. It's the very definition of 'inpspiration'.

You can do both, you know. Laugh and pee your pants. Don't ask me how I know.

I hope I'm going to be a paid contributor to another blog soon -- a writing job that I would be grateful to get and thrilled to do, not least because I really respect the people for whom I would be working.

However, as all freelancers know, "no man (or woman) can live by bread alone." Which in a freelance context means that no one can survive, comfortably, with only one client or project at a time.

So I've been thinking about what I might do to supplement that projected income that would present no conflict of interest with the primary client. And the answer may well be to focus on art-related work, whether an endeavor of my own or a project for whomever.

A combination of both writing and art projects would suit me perfectly anyway; I've always hated the pressure to choose between them. (Why are we Americans so dedicated to the notion of specializing?)

So. A cartoon, or drawings to accompany the writing of others on a women's blog, may well be timely pursuits. Or I could paint portraits, although that is a dying art. There's still a market for painting portraits of people's pets, though.)

Thinking further ahead, I've also been talking to the Director of the Center for Women in Charleston about collaboratively developing one or more topic-specific seminars that I might present there next year, if I can gain permission to present them elsewhere, thereafter.

I'm working, slowly, on a non-fiction, coffee table book, aimed cynically and specifically at the ego-driven deep pockets of Wall Street fat cats. And I'm finally going to screw up my courage, after redrafting and editing it, to submit a novel I've written (which has effectively been gathering dust since 2006) to a particular publisher who specializes in a particular genre in which, if I am careful, it would fit like a glove.

As you pointed out, Still, time is passing far too swiftly. What do I have to lose, except false pride, at this point?

Curiously, any one of these endeavors may represent greater odds of success than some of the other things I have actually considered doing, in desperation, as my financial situation worsened. But I know I am ill-suited to these jobs, however temporary, and the irony is that the temporary factor might be the employer's decision rather than my own. Office temping? I tried that, but the lawyer I worked for was unamused that in typing his letters I corrected his grammar and punctuation. Substitute teaching? On one's feet all day, attempting to maintain order rather than contributing anything useful, all for @$50 a day, once in a while. Retail? Ha. On one's feet all day for minimum wage, before taxes, working on rotating shifts that include evening and weekend hours. (Sure, I know how to use a scanner and I could, if pressed, run a cash register. But could I bear the long hours and endless ennui or, more to the point, could I properly balance a cash drawer at the end of a long shift?) And, finally, there is no question that I would make a dreadful greeter at Wall-Mart; rather than smiling and greeting, I would be constantly tempted to urge patrons to leave immediately to shop elsewhere, ready at a moment's notice to expound on WalMart's hiring, firing and health care practices.

If the Peter Principle is "rising to one's level of incompetence," the inverse can also true; it is quite possible to take a lesser-skilled job and fail at it, thereby regressing to one's level of incompetence.

True story: a retired music professor I know took a Christmas job at a local department store. The phone rang. She picked up the bar code scanner and lasered her own ear, puzzled by why the phone was still ringing.

I rest my case.

Well, I like the idea that you have more than one iron in the fire, and are actively exploring opportunities. I hated the idea of you curling up and giving up. I should have known you wouldn't do that!

The only good thing about accepting a minimum wage job (or 2 or 3) is that it gets you out of the house and provides grocery money. If you have got some kind of money coming in, and are not allowing yourself to succumb to depression, it probably isn't necessary.

As I said, my choices are made easier in that I don't have to provide for myself. I am so in awe of those of you who can and do.

Hey I do like that more. Thanks for sharing.

I am actually in the process of realizing that dream right now. I am in nursing school working towards becoming a nurse practitioner specializing in HIV disease. I hope to either work for or open a low-income/free clinic to work with poorer people. I will have a meditation room and hold yoga and meditation sessions a few times a week, working on the mind, body, and spirit of those patients. Money isn't a big deal to me anyway, my fiance is an Economist so I leave the budgeting stuff up to him. I grew up poor and my heart is with poor people. I just want enough to live decently comfortable, put my kids through college, and retire on a farm someday. I realized my dream, my purpose and decided to go for it. I've never felt happier and I'm lucky enough to have found that purpose at 26. I've been on a deep spiritual journey lately that has led me away from the confines of the religion I grew up in and into more of an eclectic understanding of life and the Universe. I've been set free and feel the joy my soul has been waiting to share and the love my heart has been longing to embrace as many people with I possibly can.

Thanks! I'll let you know when I have them ;^)

I'm not telling. At least not right now. Ideas and dreams alike are so fragile when they're being born. Nice blog.

I'm glad you gave me the benefit of the doubt, because I deserve it. My intentions were pure.

I am so glad that it looks like you may be able to cobble together an income that will not force you to accept a part time job. I do not have ANY blind spots as far as what part time employment might entail, in terms of physical difficulty. But there ARE jobs out there that allow you to sit (toll booth operators, receptionist, data entry, etc.) Are they readily available? Probably not in this economy.

My point was merely to get you out of the house instead of becoming a depressed recluse, and perhaps adding a little regular, albeit small amount, of money into your life.

What you and many others are experiencing is not right ww. It is demeaning to be at the mercy of the cold cruel world, especially at your age, and given that many of your misfortunes were not self induced. I can only imagine how frightening it must be.

Please do not EVER feel like I am judging you, or making light of your circumstances, or having a "get over it" attitude.

You are not in this boat, because you do have marketable skills that may allow you to freelance, but there are many who have no choice other than to either end up on the street, or work themselves literally to death to avoid it.