A Vote for Women

Gentle readers, tomorrow is a big day.

Tomorrow is your MatchGirl's birthday. And, as happens from time to time, it's election day.

All your MatchGirl wants for her birthday (unless you're related to me, then I want presents) is for you to go to your polling place and cast your vote.

It's a big deal.

There's a lot at stake.

And if you are a woman; or if you are someone who care about women; or if you think that women are equal to men in every way, shape and form; then there is only one way that you can vote tomorrow.

Late last month, I shared the reasons that I would be voting for President Obama.
I hope you will, too.

Find And Follow Your Passion With New York Creative Interns

This post was originally posted on Work It Brooklyn:


On November 10th, join creative college students and young professionals for a full-day of discussions and workshops designed to give you the tools needed to create you dream career. Meet creatives from the most exciting companies in New York City, get an edge in your career, and make amazing connections.

Our friends at New York Creative Interns are hosting another spectacular event and Work It Brooklyn is so stoked to announce our involvement as media partners for this amazing event. Speakers include creative professionals from Travel Channel, New York Magazine, USA Network, Behance, MoMA PS1, and many more. The event also includes a 50+ company career fair.

Start your Saturday morning keynote is Tina Roth Eisenberg (aka @swissmiss), attend the internship and career fair and choose amongst several cool sessions to attend over the course of the day.

For our Work It Brooklyn peeps, might we suggest:Seeking Success Within: Reveal What You Want & How To Achieve It with Rhonda Schaller, Director // Center for Career & Professional Development Pratt InstituteFrom Creation to Compensation: Overcome the Starving Artist Stigma with Rebecca Taylor, Communications Director // MoMA PS1; Tim Smith, Manager // Marvel Comics; Opus Moreschi, Colbert Report; Sarah Cooper, UX Designer // GoogleCreative Alchemy: Convert Opportunities into Career Gold with Monico Lo, Senior Art Director and Megan Nuttall, Senior Writer // both of kbs+The Art of Negotiation: How to Earn What You're Worth with (friend of Work It Brooklyn) Jim Hopkinson, President // Hopkinson Creative Media

But, hey, if that particular line-up is not your thing, check out the schedule and choose the sessions you’d like to attend.

Details:Find & Follow Your Passion: A Full Day ConferenceBy NY Creative Interns in partnership with the Center for Career & Professional Development at Pratt Institute.Date: Saturday, November 10, 9am - 5:30pmLocation: Pratt Institute. 200 Willoughby Ave, Brooklyn, NY 11205Register: conf.nycreativeinterns.com

Tickets: Students: $50 // Recent Grads: $75 // Young Professionals: $150Work It Brooklyn members, use the code WorkItLove for 20% off any non-Pratt ticket.Register and learn more: conf.nycreativeinterns.com

VOTE | Of Mitt and Women: Choose Your Candidate Wisely

Gentle readers, it's been a while since your MatchGirl has posted here.

Forgive me for that.

There are reasons, but they are not important.



What is vitally important is that you go out and vote on November 6th.

You may or may not know that November 6 is your MatchGirl's birthday. And this year, albeit a little late in the game, I have decided, in lieue of all the gifts and cocktails you were going to buy me (not you Boyfriend), that I would love it if people would donate a little bit, whatever you can spare, to support the President's re-election. If you're in, click here.

The image above shows suffragettes, women who had to work hard to get the right to vote. To get the smallest bit of recognition. For whom equality was a dream.

"No self respecting woman should wish or work for the success of a party that ignores her sex." 

Susan B. Anthony. 

Oh, dear readers, your MatchGirl could not agree more!

You know that your MatchGirl is an outspoken liberal, a supporter of the working class, someone who has seen hard times, who grew up in a family that made less than the average family on the block, a defender of women's equality. You know how important I think it is to get out and vote.

So you might be surprised that your MatchGirl is not going to tell you how to vote.
No. That's not my place.
I hope you'll vote the way that I will, (and donate to the cause) but more importantly, I hope you will look at everything that is at stake - truly at stake - and vote with your heart.
It's a big deal.

A few things to keep in mind as you make your way to the polls on November 6th:

Four of our Supreme Court Justices are over 70 years old. And while Supreme Court Justices often stay on the bench till well into their 80s, there is a definite possibility that the next elected president of the United States could shape the face of the coming court.

What does that mean?
It means that women's rights could be set back. Not just when it comes to making their own health care choices, though the Romney/Ryan ticket has vowed to overturn Roe v Wade, and both have gone on record at various times to say that they don't believe choice should ever be an option (still Ryan's postion, though now Romney has the nomination, he's pulled back a teensy bit).

Let's keep going.

It also means no fair pay act for women. Because Mitt Romney does not believe that women are equal. Beyond needing binders full of them.

Let's talk unemployment and the economy. Sure, Mitt Romney knows how to buy and sell companies. He knows how to make some cash. He knows how to outsource jobs to China. But while Governor of Massachusetts, Mitt didn't have astronomical job growth, as he tries to spin and as he promises that e'll bring to the country. Sure, he had some growth and left MA a little better, perhaps, than he found it. But he didn't win a second term. There's a good post on the Boston Globe website laying out the facts in a pretty even way.

The Salt Lake City Tribune, a fairly progressive paper in a lees-progressive state, came out recently with an endorsement of President Obama. A lot of people were floored (of course, a lot of people also think that Mitt Romney is from Utah because of his Religion - he's from Michigan) by this endorsement.

And so, dear readers, I'll leave you with their closing remarks:

In considering which candidate to endorse, The Salt Lake Tribune editorial board had hoped that Romney would exhibit the same talents for organization, pragmatic problem solving and inspired leadership that he displayed here more than a decade ago [with the Olympics]. Instead, we have watched him morph into a friend of the far right, then tack toward the center with breathtaking aplomb. Through a pair of presidential debates, Romney’s domestic agenda remains bereft of detail and worthy of mistrust.

Therefore, our endorsement must go to the incumbent, a competent leader who, against tough odds, has guided the country through catastrophe and set a course that, while rocky, is pointing toward a brighter day. The president has earned a second term. Romney, in whatever guise, does not deserve a first.

I'm with the Salt Lake City Tribune. The reasons that I've laid out above? Those are just some of the reasons that I will be casting my ballot for President Obama and Vice President Biden on November 6. I won't tell you how to vote, but I hope you'll see fit to vote the same way.

The Creative Life

On the weekend, gentle readers, your MatchGirl was listening to Studio 360 on WNYC. Part of the program was about arts funding in public schools (check it out here). Or, more to the point, if a turnaround arts initiative could save schools.

Your MatchGirl only knows what this piece told her about the initiative. But she knows this. Art saves students. And that will be what saves schools.

When your MatchGirl was a kid, she went to several schools. Being the shy, bookish girl before that was a hip thing to be, it wasn't easy to make new friends. But the art room was always a place of solace.

I never would be the smartest kid in class. I would never be the prettiest and I most certainly could never have been, no matter how I longed for it, the most popular. But I could go into the art classroom and feel smart and talented and like I could do anything that I wanted to. I could be accomplished. And I could feel admired.

That was just the self-esteem part of things.

Having the opportunity to participate in arts programs also made me aware that there is seldom one right answer. It made it clear that one could use creativity to arrive at the truth. 

I was never one who did well on standardized tests, probably because of this. My world was always in shades of grey. There was always something that could be the right answer, if only I knew more of the puzzle pieces. 

The thing is, dear readers, when we get out of the classroom and into the real world, it's not so black and white as bubbles filled in with a Number 2 pencil, either. We need creative thinking to make our way in the world - in personal relationships, in the work place, too. Think where we would be without creative thinking. 

And I don't mean think where we would be without the painters and the poets and the composers. Creative thinking is what drives the greatest innovations in our world. Engineers, scientists, mathematicians ... all of these disciplines rely on people who can think outside of previously drawn lines to come to new discovery. 

And they can't land on these discoveries if they've never been taught to wrap their head around problems from a different perspective.

Your MatchGirl, for one, hopes that this initiative proves its worth. And that expands to other schools. She hopes that the school system realizes how many children "No Child Left Behind" is truly failing. 

Who knows, a little creative thinking might help ...

Image: Life

May Day

Today marks May Day, gentle readers, a day when we take pause and think about the rights of those who labor daily. The workforce has changed, of course, since the origins ... but we're still a world full of workers.

What will you do today?
Will you join the Occupy movement in protest and strike?
Will you go to work like it's any other day?
Will you take a moment to think about where we, as workers, as unemployed and underemployed, stand in this world?
Will you look at the protests around the world and think that you have it so good? Or so bad?

Your MatchGirl is interested in your comments. Tell me.


Image source

The Road Less Travelled

Your MatchGirl, gentle readers, has been freelancing since her layoff in January.

This has been an interesting ride for a girl who always takes the safe steps. The secure path. But the more I think about it, I wonder how secure that path has really been.

It's been the easy path. Yeah. That's right. It's been the easy one.

And I'm done with the easy path.

Because the easy path hasn't brought me the security that it was supposed to. It didn't bring me a 401K or a ton of money or a house with two cars in the yard... The easy path has just been the not scary one.

So now, dear ones, your MatchGirl is on the scary path. The one she's not quite sure where it leads. There may be bumps ahead, but there might be mountains to get to the top of. All I can do is keep travelling down it, making choice as I go along.

What path have you taken, gentle readers? What is the scary choice that you've made lately? And was it for the best?

I want to know.

Gut Feeling

Gentle readers, your MatchGirl has posted here, many times, about how important it is to follow your heart. Especially in your job search. In the quest for your career. And I've written before about facing your fears.

Some of these things I wrote when I was employed, some when I was unemployed. Some I wrote having faced the problems. Some I wrote not having truly dealt with them at all.

But, dear readers, you know that your MatchGirl would never give you advice that she herself would not take.

So today I remind you to follow your gut. Face your fears. And don't only dream your dreams, but figure out how to live them.

If I can do it, even if tenuously right now, then you most certainly can, too!