I admit it. I've been downwardly mobile for over a decade and a half now. My best year ever, financially, was also the worst year ever of my life. 1994. I made a bundle that year, mostly because I got fired in May and was immediately taken back, as a consultant, for the remainder of the year. I'd be embarrassed to get specific with numbers, but it was a hefty (low) six-figures.
A year after that I made nothing. And that continued for another two years. I was just blowing the principal I'd managed to acquire working on Wall Street.
Today I make a respectable chunk of change, although nothing near what I used to make.
But even at that, it's sometimes tough to make ends meet (and to continue to put aside a hefty percentage of my gross every year into my 401-K).
My friends all have a pretty good idea what my situation is. And they all know about my storied past on Wall Street (God knows, they've had to hear it often enough).
So imagine my surprise when one of my closest friends in my 12-Step home group, a man I respect a lot, stopped in the middle of Third Avenue at 60th Street this morning to announce to me that he'd like very much to go into business with me.
I have never been afraid of hard work, nor have I been afraid of plunging in and learning new things. But I HAVE been afraid of success for my whole life. I spent the 80's doubting my good luck and convinced that it was only a matter of time "before I got found out and the axe fell on my neck." Even though that never happened (we alkies love to live in 1) resentments and 2) irrational fears.)
Could my Higher Power, whom I recently asked to hit me over the head with some good stuff, be pointing me in a direction She'd like me to go?
Is it possible to reverse the Tides of Fortune?
More will be revealed.....
5 comments:
I am sorta strangely dipping a toe into the own business thing. I am doing some unpaid evangelizing and consulting on online community building with Blog Catalog. no money now, but if the investor comes through the possibility of a paid position or share in the biz later.
(And yes I know the potential folly of working for free but I like the owner very much, I like the product and this may be a way to do my own thing, librarying for security and insurance, working for blog cat and tastefuly monetizing my blog, if I can make it a success, Could = a blended career that would move ron and I from poor back to comfortable and I would be pursuing my passions and not slave to machine...)
and Ron, please do join us on Blog Cat. I am a moderator in the Carpetbagger group. we have some very intelligent and eloquent posters. haven't had these kinds of exchanges since the glory days on 17
curiouser and curiouser... Waiting with bated breath.
Alan,
Remember what Zorro, the Gay Blade, once said. "There is no disgrace in being poor... only in dressing poorly." Or something like that. I'm okay with you making big bucks off your blog but if it starts looking like a visit to Perez Hilton's Juke Joint, it'll be all over between you and me! Keerist, that place is practically unreadable these days.
BTW, I'm now certified as a member of Blog Cat. Now I just have to figure out how it works.
(having trouble finding you on blog cat did you use joyzeeboy as your handle?)
ok. finally found your blog cat profile. I added you as a friend and asked my buddy JD (a really smart fag just down the road from you in Philly) to add you as well.
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