I was laid off on Friday March 13, a day short of my 11^th wedding anniversary. 

I’ve applied to 53 jobs in the past two weeks. Only five have responded. None have asked for an interview. 

Unemployment hasn’t responded to my claim since I filed a month ago.

My wife is unemployed too. She quit a job that overwhelmed and exasperated her about a month and a half before everything shut down.

We have two kids. I’m in charge of keeping my eight-year-old on point with distance learning. I’ve been given no clear curriculum by the school district. I have no idea what I’m doing. 

The four-year-old had four, five intense meltdowns today over nothing.

We couldn’t afford to pay daycare for no services rendered, so we forfeited our kids’ spots.

When it hasn’t been unseasonably cold and rainy, we’ve been bad about going outside. 

My mother turns 78 next month. She is a widow and lives alone 40 miles away. My mother-in-law is also an elderly widow who lives alone. She’s 280 miles away.

And then there’s this blog

It may sound like the least of my problems, but lately I’ve been preoccupied with how to make this blog successful. Except, the world has shut down and my life is boring. And there are only so many “How to look good on Zoom” bullets in my gun.

The blog quandry led me to a post on Medium by Sergey Faldin. A great read. I’ve long had this feeling that I’d like my blog — my brand or whatever you want to call it — to be the written equivalent of Casey Neistat vlogs. I began watching his vlogs on a daily basis two years ago. He tells stories with enthusiasm, purpose, and style. He loves his work, enjoys his friends, and obsesses over things he is passionate about. It occurred to me at some point that I don’t have a go-to blog that makes me feel the same way about art, technology, and lifestyle the way his chosen medium does. Maybe I could try to fill the void.

Faldin made some great connections between Neistat’s work and how I can approach blogging that will help me get out of my own head. I received such positive feedback on my Zoom post, I’ve put pressure on myself to be equally informative, relevant, and successful every time out. Neistat, by way of Faldin’s post, has given me permission to be OK if every post isn’t a homerun. “Write about what is bothering you. If you’re angry or upset, create a video about that. No matter what happens, just don’t stop creating.” To quote Faldin quoting Neistat:

I think that’s what YouTube uniquely possesses in its audience over any other distribution outlet is that the audience is so fine-tuned to bullshit.

Their bullshit detectors are so highly refined that even the slightest amount of bullshit will set off their alarm, and then you’ll be rejected; the audience, the community will reject you immediately.

So a great place to start is one of honesty, one of frankness.

I’ve heard this all somewhere before

As a content writer of five years (marketer of seven), one of the biggest battles I’ve waged on a daily basis is trying to convince everyone else that being the most honest form of ourselves with an intent simply to relate and help is the best foot we should be putting forward. People are so inundated by bullshit day in and day out, every communication screaming about the revenue our product can generate is an errant fart in the wind. 

In my experience, marketers can get so caught up in the bottom line, so incredibly desperate to record that MQL that’ll boost KPI in their QBR, they completely lose sight of the fact that one of the greatest magic tricks is to penetrate their prospect’s natural defenses. Jumping up and down, hand raised, yelling “HERE! HERE! LOOK OVER HERE!” amidst an ocean of others yelling the exact same is not productive. 

How crazy is it, then, for me to realize that in trying to market me, I’m guilty of the same crime. I’ve been trapped in my townhouse rental obsessively trying to crack a code to which I’ve had the answer all along. It’s time to start practicing what I preach at every content marketing job I’ve had: just communicate frequently and drop the ulterior motives.

So about my failures …

I discovered a Facebook group that shares information about what is going on with California’s unemployment department. They have a couple tricks I’m going to try to get my situation moving.

Meanwhile, I’m still applying to jobs every day. I was a finalist for two jobs I was super stoked about last month but didn’t end up making the final cuts. Even when the world isn’t in crisis, it’s a struggle finding work in this profession. That is to say, I’m not radioactive. I will keep at it.

My wife is being a champ through this whole thing. She’s gone from an occasional, reluctant cook to our very own Alton Brown. She will deflect it all but it doesn’t matter. Her efforts are keeping us safe and fed. Just another reason we’ve been married 11 wonderful years and are still going strong.

The eight-year-old has been surprisingly positive and upbeat, all things considered. He has his moments, but he’s been so incredibly flexible during an impossible time.

The four-year-old is really a sweetheart. Ninety-five percent of the time he’s extremely affectionate. He lets us know regularly that he loves each of us, which heals when you’re mentally exhausted.

The rest of our financial problems will work themselves out, one way or another. We’re enrolled in Obamacare now. I assure my wife if all else fails, we can move in with my mother. Not ideal, but there are far FAR worse fates out there right now. Even my mom and my mother-in-law both have learned to adapt and survive.

And this blog — my goal is to form some connections by way of a few explainers and probably a bunch of observations about what’s going on around us.

Though the headline is true — I do feel like a failure — my salvation is that I’m not crippled by it. I’m not distraught, I’m not looking for a pep talk, I don’t need anyone’s affirmations (thanks anyway). All the clichés in the book get me by: Don’t sweat the small stuff. Focus on what I can control, not what I can’t. Get busy living or get busy dying; that’s god damn right. At the end of the day, I stand by the decisions that brought me to this point, and if it all ends in disaster, I can live with it.

You do the same.