Miracle baby is visiting and I think one of my brother said a few months ago that maybe it was time to stop calling her MB but I still see the miracle in her. Born 1.9 lb, she caught up to that prematurity and has thrived. Now she wants to run off to New York with great aspirations to be a photographer or work in creative in an ad agency – oh my younger dreams unrealized. Instead I write about advertising and watch Mad Men voraciously – for everything that advertising could be called, manipulation, lies, propaganda, there is something about advertising that has fascinated me from the get go.
I’ve met young and old uns before who had pipe dreams but her’s is grounded in reality. No fine art photographer her, no, she wants a career that is creative but professional (read: paying). Don’t I understand that.
The other day, we watched the ending of Series 3 of Mad Men where the small core group split off to start their own firm – it had a feeling of YES! of mavericks, of the individual striking out for the frontier, it had all the realistic but idealistic passion and energy that Miracle baby will take to New York City with her and it had all the pulls at my gut I thought might have been put in abeyance on turning 50.
A photographer was reviewing Miracle baby’s blog and I said she has done all that despite having a father in prison, and my friend turned very pointedly and said, “She’s achieved this Because she has a father in prison.” So linking back to prior ruminations about adversity – it does build character – it does make you stronger.
But more importantly adversity isn’t something you just go through once and say well I had my adversity and here I am. Adversity also exists side by side with taking risks because sometimes you might fail and sometimes you might succeed gloriously.
Perhaps miracle baby will storm New York and the advertising scene for me (coincidentally her parents had the glorious big wedding dream I wanted in the Blue Room at the Roosevelt but instead I got married to my first husband in 1983 in my brother’s back yard having decided to invest the $10,000 my father offered us cash or wedding). Now maybe she’ll live the dream I wish I would have had the wherewithall to embark on at a young age rather than marrying.
No matter, I’ll continue to write about media from my tower at the LaLa, and I’ll nurture the flame that has dulled somewhat in my ideals of what a career is about, and where motherhood now vies strongly with all the other ambition I ever had.
Remember this is still just Book 4, Chapter 1.