Happy Wednesday, friends! I hope this week is treating you well. I’m returning to my Ask Stephany Anything series for my final set of questions. My answers to the questions posed by these two blog friends were very wordy so I decided to give them their own post! Let’s dive in:
Suzanne asks…
As a former copywriter, I am curious about your job. How did you get into it? What are the best and worst parts about it? Was there something else you always thought you’d do for your career?
I got my job as a content writer for my current company after over a year of job hunting. I was working as a marketing assistant at a direct marketing company and hated it. There was never enough work for me to do and the job wasn’t challenging at all. I wanted to stay in marketing, but something that was focused more on the writing side of things than the analytical side (which is what my job at my old company had evolved into). I knew I had the writing chops to work as a copywriter, so I searched for copywriting/content marketing jobs and went through a rigorous process to get the job I have now, including writing three different writing samples. It was all worth it!
The best part of my job is that every day is different. Some days I’m writing all day, other days I’m in meetings, and other days I’m editing or publishing content to websites. Another thing that I really like about my job is that I’m not micromanaged. As long as I get my work done, my bosses don’t care about the order in which I get things done. They aren’t constantly checking in with me about this or that task. (This was a significant departure from my old job!) And it’s fun to learn new things! I have learned so much about so many different topics: replacement windows, roofing, house siding, gutter systems, foundation repair, cancer types and treatment, Covid testing, heart conditions, etc. I can now debate the merits between shingle and metal roofs as well as discuss all the different types of Covid tests and when to get which one. For someone who loves to learn, this is a great job to do it in.
The worst part of my job is that it can get monotonous at times. Even though every day is different, we work on a monthly schedule so sometimes it feels like Groundhog Day when I have to just repeat everything I did last month. More writing, more editing, more posting. It can also get very stressful, especially towards the end of the month when everything is due.
I don’t think I ever really thought about what I wanted from my career, honestly. It just wasn’t something I thought about much growing up. Well, that’s not strictly true. I definitely thought I wanted to be a veterinarian because I loved animals so much. However, I took one college-level Anatomy & Physiology course and quickly realized that a science major was not in the cards for me.
Originally, I thought I’d go into teaching because it seemed like the most obvious path for someone like me. But teaching isn’t one of my skill sets, which became quickly apparent when I was doing my teaching internships. After that, I switched my major to communications to do something that was more writing-focused and decided to seek out marketing jobs. I didn’t exactly know what in marketing I wanted to do, but that industry seemed the most interesting to me.
Anne asks…
Were you exclusively a “dog person” before getting Eloise and Lila?
We didn’t have cats in my family growing up. My grandma was allergic to them, and we were more of a dog family than anything else. My mom grew up with dogs, and I’ve had a dog in my life since I was 10. I was never someone who didn’t like cats, but I did believe in the very wrong assumption that cats are aloof jerks and dogs have way more personality.
It was during the last few years of Dutch’s life that I decided my next pet would be a cat. Those years were incredibly difficult from a caretaking perspective. He needed frequent bathroom breaks (every 3 hours) and he didn’t settle down at night very easily, which could be frustrating and very tiring. I spent many hours trying to help him get comfortable enough to sleep at night. (Eventually, he went on medication to help with his nighttime anxiety.) At the time, I was working in Tampa five days a week. It was a 40-minute round-trip drive to come home at midday to take him out. (My mom, bless her, helped out with these walks, usually 3-4 times a week.) I also had to come immediately home after work to take him out. I was happy to do it, of course, and I wouldn’t wish those years away for anything. But it was very exhausting, especially doing it all alone. My next pet would need to be much easier to care for and able to be alone for long periods. (Of course, this is way before I knew my work life would be changing drastically and I’d be home all day every day!)
Then, the more I thought about having a cat, the more excited I became! I have always loved cats; I just never had a chance to bond with one. But if I was at a friend’s house and they had a cat, I was always enamored with it. I’m equal opportunity when it comes to animals!
And now I have my girls. Eloise and Lila are not aloof jerks with no personality! They have oodles of personality (like all cats do!) and are the sweetest, snuggliest, most special babies. I love them so much!
Anne also asked…
What sparked your deep love of reading and writing? You are such a literary-minded soul, and I always love to know if it was a teacher, or a parent, or a friend, who helped make books/writing such a passion for those who love them.
I have always been naturally inclined towards reading. I was the kid who loved the language arts/reading part of school way more than the math/science. My mom was probably the person who made me a reader, though, as she was always reading and took me to the library every single Saturday when I was a kid so that I could pick out books. I would always check out the maximum number of books I was allowed to check out (at the time, it was 12) and voraciously read them throughout the week. I think it helped that my mom encouraged my love for reading and never made me feel like I should be doing something else with my time. (I mean, I was also a nerdy student who would do my homework the moment I got home, so she never had to worry about that with me, haha.) Books are a source of comfort for me, and there’s never been a drop-off reading period in my life. I know many people read less and less in high school and college, but that never happened to me. I’ve always kept reading as my #1 hobby.
What career did you want to have growing up?
This was so fun to read! I love cats too, but am allergic (and not willing to pay out of pocket for allergy shots), so I love seeing photos of your kitties! Thanks for answering my question! I love knowing the ins and outs of people’s work lives!
This was fun to read for me, too! I knew what you did for a living but didn’t know how you got into that industry! Our jobs are as different as can be, but there are a lot of parallels – I have a ton of variety in my work, I do not get micromanaged, and there are so many opportunities to learn since there are many factors that impact the financial markets! And I’m around really smart people, probably the smartest people I’ve ever worked with!
When I was a kid, I think I wanted to be a lawyer, probably because I liked to argue. Ha. No wonder Paul is the ultimate negotiators and is always trying to get his way w/ things. 😉 But as I approached college, I thought I wanted to make be a clinical lab scientist. I took 1 chemistry course and said NO THANKS. I didn’t take any math courses that fall and I realized how much I missed it when I was happily helping people on my floor with their algebra and other math courses. So I declared my math major from there and never looked back. After college I really didn’t know what I wanted to do and I did consider law school. But I read a book called “The Law School Confidential” and it helped me see that law was not the right area for me. I really do not enjoy writing which is probably surprising! I like writing for pleasure on my blog but HATED writing research papers and had to write so few as a math major since many of my electives were in finance and other numbers-based courses. Turns out being a lawyer requires a lot of writing. I think I had pictured the lawyers I saw on tvs/movies and that is just a small sector of the law industry so chances were I’d start off writing briefs. Which sounded just awful. So I bopped around quite a bit in my 20s until I found my home in finance, specifically working in the bond market industry. I’ve been in this industry for over 10 years now and know it’s where I’m meant to be! Funnily enough, it’s so math based so while I don’t use what I learned in college necessarily, it’s a natural fit for a math person. In fact, yesterday I taught a course to our new hires called “Bond Math”! Ha!
Ah1 You answered my questions! Thank you! (Sorry, STILL catching up on blogs…) I loved Suzanne’s question, too – I do not see you as a teacher. That was my other option, as well, until my parents made me spend a 1/2 day with a friend of theirs who taught kindergarten.
No. Way. Just… no. I could be a nurse and have 2 sedated patients, or… I could be riding herd on a platoon of insane five year olds. HECK no. 🙂
And I’m so happy you have your girls, now. I remember reading about Dutch and how difficult the end of his life was, and I’m glad you are once again experiencing the love of a pet (well, in this case two – or maybe four, counting your mom’s dogs!). I wish I were not allergic – I love dogs, but a cat would be so much easier in my apartment. Sadly, they make my sinuses and eyes miserable. 🙁
Finally, isn’t it fascinating that so much of who we are is just, well, instilled in us by our families? I was always encouraged to read, too – any book, any time. I have memories of reading in the backseat of the car, holding the book up to catch the headlights of the car behind us (why we did not have book lights, I do not know… it was not the dark ages!), reading under the covers, reading at the lunch table on weekends, reading while I walked around the house (sometimes dangerous, because, stairs), and on and on. My parents did not allow reading in church -that was it. Any other time was pretty much fair game. 🙂