The Salon Series

Inspired by American writer, Gertrude Stein’s, salon talks in Paris where she hosted the likes of Ernest Hemingway, Pablo Picasso, and Scott Fitzgerald, for hearty and robust discussion in her home, I thought it fitting given I had moved into a beautiful place in Lower Pac Heights in San Francisco, to replicate my own version of the salon series.

Three good friends in PR tech came along on Saturday night and we kicked off with the following topic: A moveable workforce in a disruptive economy still ruled by legacy.

The aim of the evening was to allow candid conversation in a private setting, and thus I've omitted parts, but in general my talk covered:

Despite the ‘disruptive economy’ the way our bosses see the workforce, is still to catch-up. Our employers, and peers around us, are still living with the mindset that a ‘permanent employee’ is best.

To be permanent comes with fitting in and has its organizational perks such as health and dental benefits, vacation and sick leave, and oftentimes, share options.

Permanent is optimal and yet there remains a disconnect, i.e. more and more of these ‘disruptive’ companies want a disposable workforce where they do not really need to invest in the employee, and yet they demand our loyalty.

So we turn to the 'Gig economy' as it’s been coined in recent media articles from top outlets such as the Wall Street Journal and The Guardian.

The article in The Guardian The ‘gig economy’ is coming. What will it mean for work?, written by Arun Sundararajan, a Professor from New York University said:

Today, more and more of us choose, instead, to make our living working gigs rather than full time. To the optimists, it promises a future of empowered entrepreneurs and boundless innovation. To the naysayers, it portends a dystopian future of disenfranchised workers hunting for their next wedge of piecework.

Hillary Clinton warned of the downsides of this informal workforce in a recent economic speech, including the potential erosion of workplace protections, citing Uber as a case in point.

As a contractor, it is on me to provide healthcare and dental. This is where being a permanent employee would have done me multiple favors. 

Professions are changing drastically in scope and the way we work is continuing to be redefined. In the PR and journalism profession alone - we have had a complete overhaul on what is valued and what’s not.

The New York Professor says:

There’s definitely a sense of freedom about being your own boss. With some planning and self-discipline, you can achieve a better work-life balance. But there’s also something comforting and settling about a steady pay check, fixed work hours and company-provided benefits.

It’s harder to plan your life longer term – such as buying a house - when you don’t know how much money you’re going to be making from one quarter to the next.

After working seven continual months as a contractor without taking any vacation or sick days, the end of my consulting gig this month signals time for a much needed rethink on next steps and time for respite. And this break of mine, of course, will be unpaid - as unlike a permanent employee – I do not get paid for vacation leave.

But sometimes, and very oftentimes – one has to ‘disrupt’ themselves by doing things such as fly to the other side of the world, and spend time among other cultures and ways of life, before we can make sense of and find our place in the disruption at home.

Picture:  Gertrude Stein is pictured at the Paris residence she lived in for 33 years, and which became a salon for the artists and writers of the era.

How the death of my mother has pulled rank over my life

With respect to a friend who posted this article to her facebook newsfeed, A Letter To The Motherless Daughters On Mother’s Day, (its content a little too schmaltzy for this Aussie), the action and article spurred me to write my own post.   

Granted the article’s author is still young, 26, and her loss acutely fresh at two years. So I’m not quite sitting in her space, even though, yes, I am a member of the club we've both been forced into kicking and screaming.

I am a motherless daughter and have been since my mother succumbed to breast cancer at age 52.

“Mum dying fucked everything up,” I said in a matter-of –fact tone to my Melbourne shrink. I had been seeing him sporadically for a few years so he knew a thing or two about my story. “It did,” he agreed.

The long and often painful road between then – losing her, five days shy of my 22^nd birthday, and now, turning 41 in July, has covered tough terrain. Wine has been a stoic friend. Cigarettes too (for the naysayers, I haven’t smoked in a while). Her dog, Walt, who I inherited at four and went onto live until he was 17.

Across the years, I’ve turned to these tried and true aids to numb the wound that simply won’t heal.

The challenge for real healing as a person is huge and something I’m only now tempted to really address.  But that’s another blog post.

Friends have helped. Reading, theatre, family, a PR career, yoga, travel, my faith…the usual things one does in life, have helped.

But through the bumpy course, there’s been a lot of destruction both to others and, as a natural by-product, to myself.

In the years since that out-loud acknowledgement to my therapist, I’ve been in a constant battle to win back myself.

Where the exterior often points to a bold and brazen warrior, the person inside is much more complex.  Aren’t we all? 

On losing my mother, a deep sense of abandonment wells inside that heavily spills over when later disappointments come.

“You’re a sensitive person too,” one of my best friend’s Juzi, has long held.

Yes, I am – but my coping mechanism across the years has been to cover this up, play strong. I’ve fought relationship battles wearing an impenetrable shield while spitting harsh words.

Age, wisdom and experience, have taught me one doesn’t win friends, lovers or favour, by being a bitch.  Instead, these days, I work very hard at being more agreeable. We all have our slips but I’m proud of how far I've come.

When mum died, I was thrust into an adult world probably a lot sooner than I was ready.  Being the only female in a nuclear family consisting of father and brother, without that maternal guide - saw me morph into a much more masculine version of myself.  This has never served me well. I’m working on it... less yang, more yin. But I will always be strong, and strong women can be alienating.

I haven’t had a mother to help navigate my adult life, instead turning to my aunties, female work mentors, and taking inspiration from female public figures: actors, politicians, authors, etc, which too has soothed.

More so, it’s been my friends, father, brother and sister in law, that I turn to. Their achievements and grace in handling their own paths and life’s events, encourages me because it is inspiring.

I didn’t marry or have children. I believe losing my mother had quite a bit to do with this. My life was no longer normal without a mother in it, at the young age of 22, so I didn’t place value on leading a normal life.

I didn’t feel pressure to do so either.  My dad and brother showed little interest in these things for me.  And throughout my 20s, while I paved a very successful PR career for myself, my personal life was often teetering the edge of firestorm hell due to residual grief. 

My mother valued work. She was pleased when I was working and wanted me in a good job.  She appreciated education.

I went to university for two degrees, and carved out a 15 year public relations’ career. I’ve often been motivated by knowing this about my mother. I know, in this achievement, she would be defiantly proud.

I’m travelling the world. Why not?  Be free now - for one day, we will be dead.

Looking death in the face of a loved one brings such perspective. Be curious and strive to live a full life. My mother’s courage has burned in me - all this time, throughout my many solo adventures, to India, Africa, Vietnam, USA, Europe, and more.

You can resent family. Mum has three surviving sisters. Each had children of their own, who now (many) have their own children. I look at my beautiful cousins still with their mothers and sometimes resent them.

My younger cousins in their 20s, don’t remember her which at times, can make me sad – but it’s practical, they were less than 10 at the time.

None of this is their fault and I’m sure on some level, me feeling resentful is a very natural response.

On Mother’s Day – not long after my mother’s actual birthday (27 April), I’ll just get on with it.  It’s a day you get through. Yes, it’s noticed and yes, it’s felt. The feeling uncomfortable and strange – amplified today where I could have very well had my own kids to celebrate with.

Yes, if mum were still around, life would be different. Not all good. She was a strong woman. There would be clashes.

She’s not here today, and yet, she is.  I’m still writing about her, remembering her, influenced by her – shaped my life around her - some 20 years on.

Photo: my school friend Sarah Willoughby, who I have known since we were 12, recently shared this picture with me. She was at her parent's house and found it. I don't remember it, but I can assume I'm 21. It wasn't long after this that mum died in anycase. I'm wearing my dad's suede jacket that he wore in the 70s. I used to love wearing my parent's vintage clothes. Mum was always a size smaller, but I could squeeze into a few things!

Not over him?­ My advice is to let other men in.

As those close to me are aware (and some not so close – my ‘open book’ nature revealed), I had a series of knocks in my life last year including two significant romantic blows.  

Significant, in that the courtships' demise hit me hard and I spent too long processing the circumstances and more time again feeling sad.

Suffice to say I have been on my own more often than not – my married brother says: “you do single well,” but of course it’s human nature for us to want more.

And during these long phases of singledom, or when love’s warmth turns cold, I find one of the best tonics for my emotional well-being is to seek the company of men.

It’s not what you think.  I'm not talking rebound, I'm referring to male friendship.

Among my network, I have young male friends; past work colleagues where we continue to support one another in our respective careers; married men – older married men; gay men – the full gamut who have added tremendous support, vitality and colour to my being and especially when the chips are down in the love stakes.

It makes it all the more sweeter when often the qualities I like in these friendships double for those I value in my romantic partnerships.  None of my male friends would qualify as macho - they are kind and caring, make excellent listeners and are good communicators.  We banter on facebook, grab a coffee or drink, and laugh.

It used to be I’d interact with males in a social context only when they were the boyfriend of my better female friend. But the advent of facebook, and I guess age, seems to have opened the door for me to develop deeper male friendships. 

My friend Adrian from Seattle said: “When one cool person finds another cool person, they should hang together.”

Sisterhood has always been important to me, the camaraderie between female-to-female creates a terrific support structure, but there is something about bonding with males.

So next time you get dumped by Romeo or have to reluctantly ‘let go’ of your non-committal, he’s just not that into you love paramour – do what I do and lean on men.

It’s a great lesson that men and woman can be friends despite years of me believing Harry moreover Sally. 

Obviously, I’d been missing out.

Photos:

1. The dapper Spanish men I met in Oslo, Norway on my September trip.

2. During my 2013 travels in India I shared many laughs with the witty and razor sharp local men.

3. When I asked the server for water, one of the men I met in this French group during CES in Las Vegas insisted she bring us champagne.  "Champagne is 'French water'," he said. 

Poetry

I met a man who adored Literature.  He studied it too and read ferociously. He used to say the classics are much better reading than modern works. So I look forward to reading Sophocles, Euripides, Homer, Chaucer and more Shakespeare. Under his influence, I just finished Virginia Woolf's Mrs Dalloway.  Next month I've organized a drinks get together and called it Caroline plays Mrs Dalloway (ie party organizer).

This man was meticulous about his reading and committed to its important place in the world. He's found his gift in sharing it with others by tutoring.

We read aloud together and it was probably the most romantic thing I have ever done. I cherish those times.

Suffice to say, I fell for more than the literature and gave my heart too soon.  Unfortunately for many, people you're close to often hear too much of your heartache.  They play the trusting ear to your sad stories.

My landlady is very good fun. She's also wickedly smart. She sometimes sends me poetry that relates to whatever life circumstance I'm going through.

She knows I too love Literature, and she knows - by now - that I have a tendency to wear my heart on my sleeve. This week she sent me this:

Never give all the Heart

By William Butler Yeats

Never give all the heart, for love

Will hardly seem worth thinking of

To passionate women if it seem

Certain, and they never dream

That it fades out from kiss to kiss;

For everything that’s lovely is

But a brief, dreamy, kind delight.

O never give the heart outright,

For they, for all smooth lips can say,

Have given their hearts up to the play.

And who could play it well enough

If deaf and dumb and blind with love?

He that made this knows all the cost,

For he gave all his heart and lost.

The dating disconnect

Relocating to another country of course comes with its challenges.

But one I didn’t think would be too different – has turned out to be totally different.

I am 40 and single.

I’ve been many ages and single.  But by 40 and single, I would have thought I’d have a fair handle on men.  Especially from someone who generally gets on very well with men; several men of all ages and marital status.

But entering into the fore of American dating has turned out to be a sharp learning experience.

Who would have known?  I’d heard Americans love Aussies – but for the Americans to get to the stage where they love love Aussies – is a process and one that has left me clueless and with copious battle scars.

I’m still not there yet  - understanding the process – by a long stretch.  I’ll need to ‘date’ several more times and across many more weeks before I even have an inkling of how it works – but let me just say I’ve met enough men romantically in the U.S. for me to realise it is completely different from Down Under.

In fact, I ran off to Scandinavia recently to escape the perils of a slashed heart after getting it all wrong with one particular American man.  Where I've now learned he would have thought we were just “dating” by his actions of pursuit, loads of kissing, everyday contact and seeing each other weekly - I thought we were on the road to relationship. Yes – we know who lost their heart and pride in that scenario.

So the differences:

Basically Australians only "date" more than say, three to four times because after that – if you still like the person – you’re in the “early days” of a relationship.

We avoid the long-winded series of dates before one has a "talk" to decide forward direction.  We tend to have that "talk" too – but much earlier on, definitely by date five.  

And as my Aussie ex-pat friend and I agreed, Australians tend to go from 0 – 60 on their interest’s scale.  For example, if an Australian likes the person and we feel it could go somewhere – we jump in no holds barred.  You are now boyfriend and girlfriend.

Here, I was held back from considering the person I liked very much as my boyfriend because he said he did not like the idea of being 'declared' as a boyfriend and that he would have a better idea if we were compatible for 'relationship' after six months of dating.  

Wow – in Australia, at our age – I wouldn’t be surprised if I was being proposed to or announcing a (mutually-wanted) pregnancy in six months (provided of course relationship going well, etc). 

In America, it appears the process takes much longer and god forbid if the woman says anything like "I'm falling for you - or I'm in love with you..." after six weeks to two months. That would be standard in Australia.  If our guy hasn’t decreed those famous three words by month four (at most) – we know “he’s just not that into you”. 

It’s not a total surprise to get an “I love you” by month two.  I had it at four weeks once – albeit that freaked me out a little – but I still got it. And we went on to have a relationship for nine months.

As well, Australian guys still pining for their ex - or not over it - tend not to "date" us either in Oz. 

They'll just hit up a lot of women to sleep with - because the connotation of "dating" in Australia means you're leading to a relationship.  An Aussie guy will generally wait until he's ready for a relationship before he enters the ‘dating’ phase.

Here I dated someone for around 6 weeks until he told me he was still "carrying forth feelings" for someone else. This was a conversation I initiated and who knows how long we would have gone on like that had I not brought the subject up.  It was awful, awful - because I'd already fallen (refer my above point that Australians have already fallen by week six). 

The other startling difference is Aussies do not tend to "date" more than one person - no, no - we would find that insulting and offensive. In fact, we don't even really call the process 'dating'.  We call it "seeing" one another (if you're seeing me - why are you seeing someone else?)

Interestingly in hindsight, I was always puzzled by The Bachelor and the way these women were totally ok with The Bachelor getting it on with several women before choosing their “one”.  

We would balk at that.  No way you can go and kiss another girl if we’re on date 3 together.  And as I said to my friend last night and to explain to her partner who is American: “If a guy I had three to four dates with were to run into me having dinner with another man on a ‘date’ – it wouldn’t be a total surprise for the three date guy to punch the other in the face!”  It’s just like that I guess. Aussies, we’re territorial – she’s my woman!   

As well, Australians are not as likely to be "friends" with their exes. Here in America - it's apparently standard and considered rude if you are not prepared to be a friend with your ex.

In Australia for instance the only ex I speak to I last spoke to about two years ago (we'll have the occasional facebook chat - but very minimal).  The immediate ex - we parted end of 2009, went out over a year, and yet, I haven't seen him or spoken to him since.  I know through a mutual acquaintance that he's married and has two kids.  

It's quite common for Australians to break-up and move on entirely - bye, bye, next one.

Sure there are exceptions especially as more and more Aussies are embracing the concept of ‘the modern man’ but if I were friends with an ex in Australia it's likely we'd still be feeling our sexual chemistry. 

Here, I hear once you’ve been relegated to the ‘friend zone’ you stay in the friend zone – no prospect of reconciliation or ‘sex with the ex’ occurs once the friends' space is established.

And my parting word - American men paying...  Well, I hear this is how it goes but I have not experienced this entirely. In three separate cases, I’ve been out of pocket by paying for myself on date one and sometimes even covering them.

So the jury is still out on that.  But Australian women for the record do not expect our first date guy to pay.  We call it “going Dutch” which basically means you split the bill.  But there is a general etiquette that whoever does the date asking is usually the one who picks up the tab. Of course, it's noticed and appreciated. The gesture is considered gentlemanly - but not mandatory. 

This is date one, perhaps also date two, but by date three we’re both paying for ourselves, or the woman is paying for brunch to make up for the man paying for dinner date one and two.

So we’ll see.  I’m a little exhausted by it.  But I’m also more aware – which helps.  Because being unaware I guarantee you – will lead to horrible misunderstanding, embarrassment and heartache.

Fortunately it’s a good thing San Francisco attracts people from all over the world because the idea of dating a man not familiar with American dating culture has obvious appeal.  

On the cusp of 40

Is it a coincidence the HBO series, Sex and the City, about a group of 30 something single women making their own way in the big smoke, was so wildly successful?  For a woman beating her path in this decade, life throws up its decade-relevant challenges (many of which you will read here in this blog – marriage, mortgage, babies – or none of the above).

In my early 20s I was a bit wild, yes; my mid to late 20s filled with ambition to learn from industry’s best and carve out a formidable career in public relations.

Most people in my clique back then were single, and those who weren’t, were just being together, they weren’t getting married or having children.  No big threat.

But my 30s – whoa – changes beyond my control across my family and friendship fold hit me (and my fellow single friends also seeing it in their own lives) like a ton of bricks.

So you can imagine the smile that formed on my face when my single friend, Justine, answered to my question: “What’s it like being 40?”  “It’s a far cry better than being in the shadow of it.”

Yes – 40.   I began dating a man only months from his 40^th birthday and he had such a meltdown over it that I realized then and there, there was no way I could be serious about a person so narcissistic. Seriously – you’re giving THIS much thought to rolling over a number? Give me a break (coincidentally he’s gone on to get married and have a baby (as most past significant others have)).

Thank goodness as the big 4-0 draws near for me (30 July), I shrug my shoulders and think –at least it gives me a chance to see my dad, who will fly in from Melbourne, to meet me in Las Vegas for a night of dinner and champagne.  

Goodbye decade of baby making friends muddled with a sense of dread and helplessness that I’m not.

Which is probably why I’ve ended up on the other side of the world – a journey I made on my own – a little out of the ordinary at my age – without a partner, home or job, but I knew I needed to change my circumstance and such change showed more promise if it were major.

“If you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you. If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you.” ― Gospel of Thomas 

I’ve made do with my situation and done the best of my independence.  Justine tells me some may even envy us.  How many our age can drop everything for a decadent week of theatre, restaurants and hanging out in the city that never sleeps? 

Stability however has called. It’s waved its hand from over the white picket fence and is tempting me to settle for a more permanent life.  

It’s a complicated position to be in – because I know I crave this inevitably – but I also know it won’t happen, or feel right, until I’ve met my match to give me reason.

The best advice I was given this week – was to live life appropriate to you.  Don’t worry what others think.  

It may be an unconventional life in terms of how society sees it – but it says more about them than it does me.

Celebrate your life and keep loving yourself – because through this means, it is likely all that is desired will unfold as it should, as I allow the road to open up that is right for me. 

Photo - Justine took my photo during interval at the opera Madama Butterfly, the MET, New York. 

The Wolf of Wall Street

I recently saw The Wolf of Wall Street, the new film to hit cinemas starring a magnetic Leonardo DiCaprio playing former Wall Street stockbroker, Jordan Belfort.

I have always loved Leo. Mainly for his acting and great films, but I also have a fond affection for celebrities sharing my age.  Leo and me were born the same year.  Kate Moss too.  

Leo is sterling in the film and despite thinking it would drag on – given the fact I’d read one New York Times review that said it was too long - as well the letter from the daughter of one of the men in Belfort’s circle (see link: Hollywood Reporter) suggesting we should know better, have a moral conscience, and boycott the film – I absolutely loved it.

Perhaps however, I shouldn’t have. This story is all too familiar. Not in the generic sense of we all know how Wall Street breeds greed but because I lived through a similar scene.  Yeah, right before the global financial crisis hit in 2008, I was on the periphery of my own Wolf circle.  

As a result of dating one of them, I was a bystander to the antics of rich and privileged boys living it up in Sydney. Their bonds made stronger by making money together.  They achieved this largely by playing the stock market guided by the tips of one of their buddies – a broker. His specialty, like Belfort’s, was ‘penny stock’.

And just like the film, I was one of the people who got caught up in the excitement of investing my money in this penny stock, believing it would be the winning financial ticket.

Only I lost it all.  And just like the film (where Matthew McConaughey’s character encourages Leo’s to give investors a false sense of a win) I would see many of my investments double on paper in a matter of weeks.  But I was too hooked and blind to cash out and as a subsequence I followed a roller coaster of ups and downs, watching it peak, then fall, climb a little again, only to crash and burn after GFC.

Post-GFC my Dad sent me an article from well-known Australian stock market analyst Charlie Aitken. I had been shaking my head in disbelief at the cold hard reality that I’d just gambled and lost my savings on fairy dust.

In this letter, Charlie quoted a line from the poem Desiderata: You are a child of the universe, no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here. And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.  

Charlie had quoted this in the context that his readers must understand if you are going to play the stock market, there will be wins and there will be losses.  Life goes on.

There are lessons to learn from this and I hope I’ve learned mine.  My father likened the crowd my boyfriend fraternized with as “cowboys” and he was right.  But unlike me, the cowboys were part of the Wolf pack and they cut their gains before they could lose. Just like Belfort and his team of brokers.

I guess the point is – I recognized a lot of my own experience in this film.  But like a lot of personal tragedies they wear to a reflective smile and wisened soul over time.