Girl on the Brink: Surviving Desperate Times with Desperate Measures

Our hobbies define us as much as our job histories. The closer they intersect, the happier and healthier we are.

Personally, writing has been both my hobby and career. I appreciate the way words can combine to evoke an image as smoky as a film noir night scene, and I marvel that word combinations seem to outnumber the stars in the universe, or is there some finality to them?

As a teenager, I won first place in a Kodak photo-essay contest while competing for a state beauty pageant title, and I now have a literary agent after having published a book with Perigee, an imprint of The Penguin Group.

Writing has also drawn me close to men who write well. A man’s writing can stimulate me as much as the heat from his body.

But writing is generally a sedentary activity, though I wrote my book while running with a digital recorder in one hand.

That’s why I love to leave the house and inhale a good salty breeze on a superyacht. Yes, I’ve been spoiled; a Beneteau just won’t do.

I have a thing for sailors. The sport attracts my kind of man, compared to powerboaters. Except for fishermen, powerboaters are typically Type A personalities, much like motorcycle riders.

A powerboater favors speed, comfort and air-conditioning. He also tucks in his shirt, which adds five years to any guy’s age, and hires someone else to captain his gas guzzler, which is often called a “gin palace” on the open sea.

Sailors, on the other hand, wear threadbare T-shirts, old shorts and well-worn deck shoes. They are also great lovers and appreciate a good woman.

But we always can’t have what we want, and life forces us to experiment with men and jobs that we’re not trained to, or would rather not, deal with.

When I first moved to Washington, D.C., I mixed drinks behind a bar and then passed a typing test on an IBM Selectric to temp as a secretary. That was during the recession of 1981-82.

Both jobs didn’t last very long. I quit the bar scene and got fired from a law firm when I talked back to one of the attorneys. I have not regrets.

Though I dipped my toe in foreign waters to gain a fresh perspective and because I had to, I’ve always retreated and returned to seeking what I like to do best, which is write and advance my writing skills.

In my search for a permanent job, I’m inclined to stick with that formula because I don’t believe, as I do with love, that work is blind.