This Freelance Life

I started writing this over a week ago but got interrupted and never completed it:

I've been pondering a lot over what being freelance means to me lately.

I think it came to a head when, over the weekend, my husband and my mother were going through the job 'page' in our local paper and reading out advertisements for me. I came up with many, many excuses for not applying.

A lot of them were based in schools - examinations coordinators, admin managers and similar. Although these had the plus of being term-time they were all 30 mins drive from home and the hours were 8.30am till 3.30pm.

1. This would mean that I wouldn't be able to take OR collect my son from school - the school gate isn't opened until 8.30am and children should be collected at 3pm.
2. My mother's assertion that she would retire from work and do the drop of and collection duty sounds great but it's a big commitment - she'd have to be at our house for 7.30am every morning and her day would be tied up with the need to be back at school for 3pm. Plus we sometimes have a volatile relationship and I'd hate for my son to be left stranded because she's suddenly decided I'm ungrateful.
3. Quite frankly I don't want to return to a full time office job.

I love being freelance. I love doing what I do.

One of my Twitter followers tweeted the other day 'Are there any other freelancers out there and what do you do?' a few hours later she tweeted again 'I know at least 3 other freelancers follow me on here but no reply - what if I was looking to place some work?'. She was quite right of course and had it not been for the time difference (about 9 hours) I would usually have answered pretty promptly - except I didn't have much work on and it was Sunday.

Sunday?! Well as most freelancers will tell you - I do often work Sundays. I have been known to work late into the night as well. It's a small price to pay for the freedom to be able to look after my son during the week and get all those little jobs that running a house and volunteering for charity entail. Family and friends help out with childcare at the weekend (and in the week) so I can do this.

So I'm digging my heels in over the job front as long as I can ...

Well it hasn't turned out to be so long as this weeks' paper had the perfect job for me - working with books, term-time, school hours - keep your fingers crossed for me!

I won't be giving up the freelancing though - as long as the work is out there!