Accountability: June 2022

Those of you that follow along regularly know that I’ve skipped a few months of these. I wish I had a good explanation as to why – yes, I’ve been on the ship working and busy and all of that – but, maybe more so I wasn’t sure I knew what I was going to say. These particular posts don’t really add much to my ‘blog’ in the way that they won’t rank on Google, there are no keywords to optimize and well, does anyone even read them?

I still don’t know what I’m going to say. But, here we go. I’m writing this while sitting on an airplane 39,000 feet in the air somewhere just a bit north of Prince Edward Island. As someone said to me yesterday, looking at me slightly confused, “aren’t you supposed to be on a boat?”

There are few things in life that hit you like death. I’ve heard having a kid is right up there on transformational life-perspective altering events but I’ve yet to do that. Instead for me it is death. And, sadly, each time someone dies I’m comforted by the fact that I know that it won’t in fact kill me – I’ve been through this before. It takes time but slowly the fatigue of grief, the almost sunken feeling in your eyes, fades. I’ve grown confident that the people working at greeting card companies have never experienced big grief. When reading cards in the grocery store aisle yesterday each card felt like an insult. “Remember a life well lived” – what if the death was unexpected and there was so much more life left to live? “Our sympathies in this difficult time”. Is this what you refer to as a difficult time? While it may in fact be a “difficult time”, the phrasing minimizes the crushing brokenness that can come during this particular “difficult time” and in a totally different way than say, breaking your leg might be a “difficult time”.

So, yes, I am supposed to be on a boat right now. I was on a boat, I am on my way back to a boat. As you may have guessed from the above paragraph death got in the way. Unexpected death. Too soon death. As a family friend at the funeral realized yesterday though, even though I was on a boat, I got to go home for the funeral.

Note: For all you diehard ship people out there, yes, the cruise ship I am on is in fact a ship. I call it a ‘boat’ out of a kind of ‘homeiness’ that I feel to it.

I’ve learned a lot over the last few weeks. The first was the slap in your face reminder to tell the people you love that you love them. (This is quite sadly not my first time learning this lesson.) Even when they piss you off. If there is a person in your life that you know will without any doubt show up for you, that will be there to cheer you on (even when you don’t know it) and loves you – tell them. Knowing someone is always there for you is great, but if you are lucky enough to have anyone in your life that if you were to call them up right now and say ‘come get me’ and they would – call them and tell them how much that means to you before they’re gone.

Side Note: I am done learning this lesson. I expect all the rest of my loved ones to live until at minimum 90 (but really my grandma is almost 86 so we might need to make it 95).

The second was less a lesson learned and rather a reminder of the incredible network of love and support that I have in my life. From friends in the Netherlands that drove hours to come see me and cheer me up when I found out the news, to a husband that after consoling me started finding me flights, to friends willing to pick me up at airports, have me crash at their house, drive me to funerals, meet me for dinner, or just go get an ice cream. And that’s not even to say my family, that despite their own grief always find ways to show me how loved I am.

The next was that my grief is valid. Follow me on this one – I’ve been working on a cruise ship that has been rented out by the Dutch government to house Ukrainian refugees. When you’re onboard it is a daily perspective shift. You realize that most of the “bad” things going on in your life are pretty small and trivial. So many of these people have experienced so much grief and trauma that when I got the news I was sad but also confused as to how I should feel. There is so much bad happening in the world, that so many people are getting up out of bed and still going – how is it possible that my grief mattered at all? Luckily I once again have friends and family that kicked that silliness right out of me.

And, probably not lastly as we are always learning but lastly for this post – my company stepped up for me. I went to the HR office onboard and told them what happened and while I expected empathy from the HR Manager as I’ve known him for a bit and we’ve got a good working relationship, I also fully expected the official policy to be something along the lines of “We’re very sorry for your loss, you can work reduced hours, here is the information for grief counseling.” Instead I got more along the lines of, “let’s talk to your supervisor, take a look at some flights, and see what we can do to get you home.” I know I work for a giant corporation, but this situation – from my supervisor in the corporate office to literally everyone on the ship (including the flowers and sympathy cards waiting to me when I got back) it felt more like a caring family. I realize that sounds cheesy. It feels cheesy to say that. Shit though, if you’re going to have a bad thing happen in life 3,500 miles away from home – this was a super supportive environment to go through it in.

So…what’s happening? Life. Sometimes while you’re onboard it feels like you are in a bubble where life at home is standing still. You’re in your own little world and what’s happening outside the ship seems foreign (ha – most of the time it is literally foreign). Life at home still happens though.

I am heading back to the ship to finish out my contract. I’ll have just under a month left onboard before heading a few months off. Onboard I’m not sure what is happening. I’ve been gone one week and, while it’s just a week – a week on a ship is like a month on land. So much could have changed in that time. Overall onboard though I just wish I could share all the good things that are happening onboard with you all. The work our cruise lines team is doing, but also Salvation Army, the City of Rotterdam, and other volunteer organizations. It’s been a really rewarding (sometimes challenging) effort to be a part of and I am so grateful for it.

And, with absolutely no segue in topics –  onto my blog accountability goals:

Blog Goals 2022:

Where I Want This Blog To Get To:

I want to grow this blog. Sometimes I am better about working towards these goals than others. These goals may prove to be just out of reach but those are the best kinds of goals!

• Get YouTube channel to 2,000 subscribers by the end of the year
  • Currently at 219, 230, 326 now! Head on over to my YouTube channel to subscribe and help me reach this goal!
• Increase the subscribers to my blog mailing list to 150
  • Currently at 82, 92, 102! Subscribe to this blog to help me reach this goal. 🙂
• Blog specific stats:
  • DA of 15 (currently 9, 10, 12!),
  • ✓✓✓ 150 Ranking Keywords (currently 56, 60, 174!!) Crushed this goal!
• Monthly views up to 10,000
  • This is now up to 2,800 per month! 🙂 Woohoo!

As Success Doesn’t Happen by Chance, Here are some Steps I’m Going to Take to Get It There

• All of this is on pause until I’m off the ship. I’ll post something sometimes but goodness me, doing both isn’t happening.

• Write four new posts each month + Accountability post
  • Have not remotely done this. However, one post I wrote randomly while in working quarantine at like 5 am one night is ranking first on Google and bringing in about 260 readers per week. Go figure.
  • Figure out Search Engine Optimization
    • Getting much better at it
• Post one short YouTube video per month (15 mins or less)
  • Did this last month? No, May? Holy crap I need to get back on this.
• Write four guest posts over the course of the year
  • Haven’t done any yet.

Want to Help Me Achieve My Goals? Here are 5 ways you can support this blog (p.s. Thank You!)

1. Subscribe and follow wherever you’re willing to!
2. If you like a post – share it!
3. Send me questions for ideas for blog posts, YouTube videos, etc! Happy to answer anything I can.
4. Feel free to use those affiliate links. My favorite product that I highlight on my blog is laundry detergent sheets through EarthBreeze.
5. Feel free to directly monetarily support this dream through Ko-fi. This money helps me pay for blog expenses such as domain fees, SEO programs, courses and tech support, as well as hopefully new cameras and microphones for YouTube. 🙂