This just in: I’ve been really depressed.
Probably not a surprising headline at this point, but you know how depression goes: you don’t usually see it coming, and only figure out you’re there once you’re soaking in it.
It’s primarily work-related, which is some of why I’ve been reluctant to talk about it, because getting into the specifics of why the work I do is hard, and why parts of it aren’t working for me always feels precarious and uncomfortably like money-grubbing, not to mention, is likely not all that interesting for anyone else. Hell, it’s not interesting to me.
But I’ve no doubt my radio silence is a bit odd, and since I’ve been doing what I do, pretty much out there for all to see here for eight odd years now, I may as well just come out with it. It’s not like I don’t have other readers who run their own businesses or work as activists, after all. At least the lot of you can share a sigh with me. I apologize in advance for going on at great length: there’s no making this brief.
As I often find myself — and have, running independent businesses and working the causes for the whole of my adult life — I’m in a finanical and existential pickle, and looking further down the road, I’m seeing the vinegar turn.
A lot of how I’m feeling I described to Mark as this: I spend my time doing what I think is building something higher and higher, but right now, I feel like maybe I was unknowingly upside down, and what looked like upward construction was, perhaps instead, me digging an incredibly deep hole for myself. It’s not a hole for anyone else, for anyone utilizing what I do and have done, but for me, personally, it really does look like that.
Many years ago (so crazy that it really is many) when I first starting shifting from classroom teaching to working full-time in sexuality — in erotica, but also in education — my pro-bono lawyer at the time told me to consider what I was doing very carefully, because if I made that choice, and got any kind of notice in making it — or even none at al - I may well never be able to go back to classroom teaching, especially not in this country, where the ethos are so insanely bizarre when it comes to fear and panic about children and adults having any sort of overt sexuality or doing anything even remotely considered sex work. I didn’t blow that concern off, by any means. I did consider it pretty carefully, and it just seemed like what I was aiming to start doing was important enough that I could live with that.
But what I didn’t really consider as well as i should have, however, was if this other work could actually sustain me. Some of why is because I was making so little and working so hard teaching that it was hard to imagine being even less financially stable. I’d also grown up poor enough, and continued to live poor enough, that at the time, it felt like if that stayed that way forever, I wouldn’t be elated, but I’d deal. Of course, having always lived scrap-to-scrap, it’s not like I’m exactly the best financial planner ever.
Throughout the now almost-ten years I’ve been working online in this arena, getting by has been incredibly difficult, because in every aspect of my work, I have been really dedicated to doing it in such a way that I did not sell out: did not misrepresent anything in order to make a buck, did not ally myself with anyone or anything that I wasn’t comfortable supporting (or felt effectively would cancel out the good I was doing with my work), did not do things in such a way that were driven by profit, rather than by the integrity and aim of the work.
It’s no news flash that when you’re working in any aspect of sex and sexuality, that is more than a minor challenge.
Now, there were a couple good years in there. Certainly, not good by a lot of people’s standards: I live pretty lean — I don’t have a car, I cook at home more than go out, I rent, I don’t own, I don’t do credit cards — but I’d be living primarily that way even if I was rolling in it, most likely. But by my own standards, there have been times when I’ve done alright. Being in at the gate before the web boom, this site here did pretty well for a handful of years before alt-porn was on the map, and when there did seem to be a market for erotic work that wasn’t porn, or wasn’t marketed as porn. When Scarlet Letters was in its heyday, and people really thought there could be a real market for women’s sexuality content (oh, you laugh now…), we had a few paying advertisers that we liked a lot (Good Vibes, Babeland: good folks who don’t exploit anyone or objectify women’s sexuality — when SuicideGirls first started, we accepted them as an advertiser, but when it started seeming — in pretty short order — like that wasn’t the great woman-run thing they said it was, we stopped working with them). Back before the dot-bomb, Scarleteen was on Chickclick’s network for a couple years, which meant that we were able to run good avertising, paying an apporpriate CPM, and working with really nice people who really supported what we did very bravely — even to the point of refusing to take us off the network when their biggest network advertiser, one of the major American personal product companies, blew a gasket about having ads run on a network which included a teen sex education site and demanded they did or else they’d pull their millions.
(Chriesta, I sound like someone’s grandma. Back in MY day….)
Scarlet Letters hasn’t been updated or shifted to something else since 2004 because for the life of me, I cannot figure out how on earth to do it in a way where it pays its own bills — without putting things on it neither I nor our readers would want — how on earth to make the time to do it, and because I don’t have the heart to sell the domain (even though it’s got some worth), because I know full well the buyer would likely use it for something noxious. I update the artwork and work here less and less often because at this point, making the work costs more per time and money than I get back for it, and flatly, the better my work gets in my eyes, the less saleable it seems to become. Plus, the move to Seattle hasn’t been good when it’s come to opportunities for photography work: I did far, far better in Minneapolis, and that’s the understatement of the century. To the point that I have sat down and looked at if it is fiscally feasible for me to just fly out there every few months to do that work, because that is still where I get the most people inquiring about having work done.
And Scarleteen. Oh, Scarleteen.
A wonderful thing Scarleteen is, I know, from a public service perspective, and from a maybe-if-I-stopped-liking-the-sex-so-much-I’d-get-sainted-for-this viewpoint, but want to know about an insanely stupid business model? Come on, I know you do.
An insanely stupid business model is choosing to serve the population LEAST willing, likely and able to support that service financially. Seriously, that’s beyond dumb. And when your second rung of support for that service is the adults responsible for that population, it’d SEEM doable, unless you consider the fact that the majority of them obviously don’t care overmuch about that service being provided for their kids, or else the kids probably wouldn’t be coming to you for that service in the first place. Tack on that the service you provide is viewed as provocative at best, and downright evil at worst (especially coming from a bent, wanton harlot like me OR from a man-hating, anti-sex hag, depending on who’s making the judgment that day), and you see just how financially suicidal that is.
Scarleteen, for most of its history, has been sustained — and me with it, especially as it’s turned into my full-time job — by donations. And yet, with every year that passes, those donations become less and less frequent. Used to be that a bad month for us per donations was when we only made $50. Anymore, if we net $50 in donations over a couple months, it’s a freaking miracle. The longer we stick around and keep up the good work, the greater our reach becomes — just over the last few months, it’s elevated over 100% — which just costs us more money and requires more time spent serving everyone, and doesn’t result in any more donations to offset that. I have one private grant — thank christ — but that’s not guaranteed to be permanent, and it is arranged to decrease over time. We’re working on 501c3 status, but a) that costs money and time, too and b) that may or may not be of a lot of help given the cultural climate right now, and it looking like it won’t change very much for quite some time.
So, when it’s looking like this, I look back to advertising, preferably as a stop-gap, not a permanent solution, for all the obvious reasons (well, obvious to me as an anti-capitalist and as someone whose work often involves correcting and fending off the effects of the media and acqusitional culture, anyway). I’ve just finally put Google AdSense on Scarleteen, and I’m not at all happy about it, but it’s certainly a lesser of other evils and it’s also something we CAN do right now to net a little income and try and hang in there until something better comes along. Beyond that running at a really skimpy CPM and so helping, but not much, and looking like arse, even with me filtering the things showing up on it like a maniac, I’m unhappy with what’s being run there overall and what I have to race to filter in the first place. Vaginoplasty ads, sexual performance “enhancers,” really gross dating services — and yep, found an abstinece-only program ad on a page — aren’t things I want on a site where I am trying to help young folks build up esteem and come to sexuality in a healthy way.
But as of right now, I’m nearly out of other options. About once a year, I’ve gone on a kick for a few weeks where I try to persuade what SHOULD be considered appropriate advertisers for us — condom companies, birth control manufacturers, books and magazines, independent media, record labels, indie designers, etc. — and every single time, it’s the same song and dance. Pretty much everyone is outright terrified as to what it would say about them and their business to be on a site “endorsing” teen sexuality and telling teens that they are still okay if they decide to be sexually active. That bit that happened with the Chickclick advertiser I mentioned up there? That was about a CEO coming home to discover that his 17-year-old daughter was reading about masturbation — and how it’s totally okay — at Scarleteen. Oh, the horror! And at the tender age of 17, no less! Having interest in her own genitals! Is there no end to my great corruption of America’s youth?
Apparently not. This week, I’ve spent time on the phone with a couple of the larger ‘net ad agencies, because our traffic and reach (and the number of pages we have) is such that most DIY ad revenue sources just aren’t feasible for me. Plus, I hate shilling for money, and don’t have the time in my day (or the heart: it’s hard not to take personally) to spend every waking minute trying to persuade advertisers that I really, truly, am not trying to turn teenagers into depraved, sex-addicted beasts, and that I’d really just like to sustain what we do for them — which they ask us to do for them — while at the same time helping them find their way to thinks like books to read and decent condoms to use, which seems like a pretty decent arrangement, no?
Not to advertisers or ad agencies it doesn’t. Never has, apparently still never will. I have one more left to talk to, but since all the others gave the usual “No, we can’t, even as great a site as I personally think it is, our higher-ups don’t want to lose ad clients, and our content needs to stay ‘clean’,” I’m not feeling particularly hopeful. This, for the record, is also what’s happening with coverage of the book so far, even in terns of getting promotional venues. Note: it WOULD be okay — and “clean” — to support my site if it was all about appearance, bikini-waxing, getting skinny, if it was a lad mag or a site full of sexist jokes and videos. But talking about birth control or clitorises or noncompulsory bisexuality to teenagers? Filth!
So, here I sit. Well, more like, here I slump and skulk. I have a seriously challenging and emotionally demanding job which requires I work more than full-time, but which pretty much never pays me for all that time, and which I sometimes even find myself in the position of having to pay for the great privilege of doing. I’m in the hole due to time I had to take to re-edit the book, costs of promoting the book, the costs and labor of the site upgarde, an upgrade I was hoping would pump up book sales and donations — as well as make it easier and more efficient for me to do the work — but instead has only increased reach and thus, cost. My usual avenues of freelance work to offset Scarleten-debt — as well as to help pay for my own personal expenses, rent, food, healthcare, the perpetually never-paid student loans, etc. — appear to be closed to me right now.
And my lawyer was right about going back to teaching. Right now, if I wanted to go back to teaching in a classroom full-time, the only way I’d get hired would be to outright lie about how I’ve been spending my time (I publish with my first and middle name only, so while given my visibility, it’s likely a lie I’d get caught in eventually, I likely wouldn’t right off the bat), which I am beyond not okay with for so many reasons. Alternately, I could invest some time in making much of my work disappear (though the book pretty much makes that impossible) so that you had to dig a lot harder for it and it wasn’t in any way active. Even thinking about effectively throwing away so many years of hard work is beyond heartbreak, and knowing that I can’t do both — this is why I left in the first place, it’s not that I was tired of teaching, I loved teaching — which means some things would just have to get shut down…ugh, it’s just too much to even bear thinking about right now. I try to make myself think that way to be practical, and I wind up weeping.
Sometimes, I get really irate about people doing any kind of work like the work I have done or do under secrecy or big pseudonyms. Often, that’s because I really do think it’s important not to do that to take the shame out of sex, even though (obviously) I fully understand the price that requires at this time (though if everyone took that risk, I think in pretty short order, things would be very different in that regard). But sometimes, it’s simple jealousy. I envy the fact that most people working in sexuality don’t find themselves in this sort of position: came from a place where it felt/feels okay to be invisible as who they are in their “other lives,” and aren’t limited in the way that I’ve set myself up to be, even though, for me, I don’t see how I could have accomplished what I have without doing it this way, very visibly.
Beyond….well, being broke, which is crappy as it is, but especially tiresome when you spend close to forty years being that way, the even harder emotional hit for me lately is that not being able to even sustain myself and my businesses in the most basic ways, despite working so damned hard, and doing something for so long, with so much dedication and in such a way that even at my low points, I don’t often doubt the value of, makes me feel valueless.
I don’t like that feeling for a lot of reasons. I don’t like it because it stands in pretty sharp conflict with my knowing full well that money and wealth, while it does PUT a value of things, does not accurately DETERMINE the value of things, and I resent my believing, even for a minute, that it does. (Plus, I hear my father lecturing me about it inside the recesses of my head, and if you think I, can go on and on for an age, you ain’t seen nothin’ yet. I’m like this for a reason, you know.) I don’t like feeling that way because even on the days when the work is harder than hell, and not a single person I help remembers to say thank you, even when I’m at a low point and so self-pitying I feel like nothing I’ve done is worth anything, it’s really important to me to be able to shake that stuff the hell off and get real, knowing that it’s psychological suicide to rely on anyone or anything else to acknowledge the value of what I do. I’ve done a ton of work in my life for absolutely no money, or very, very little, because it was of real value and I was able to do what needed to be done: money shouldn’t determine a value.
But I’m having a harder and harder time believing that of late, and the more time goes on. I can see 40 from where I’m sitting, and I really don’t want things to be like this when I get there. When I see the things people hurl money at and fiscally support, it makes me more and more bitter and less and less optimistic. Some woman wants new boobs — not because she had breast cancer, even, but because she just wants new boobs — and she makes that about all the big, wonderful men helping her achieve that “goal,” and she can raise money for that, but I can’t often for the life of me get fiscal support to help prevent rape or help someone heal from one, to help someone avoid an unwanted pregnancy, or let some girl know her boobs are just flippin’ fine so she can achieve productive goals, actual acheivements, and NOT wind up the woman grubbing for cash by flashing skin to get fake boobs in a vain attempt to feel better about herself, who will most likely ultimately come back to just needing someone to tell her she’s just fine as she is TO feel better. I could go on for an age with these examples, but I’m not going to, because it’s just too pathetic and I just get pissier and pissier the longer I go on about them. Plus, y’all know the stuff I’m talking about.
A week or so ago, I had someone write me back in reponse to trying to arrange a promotional event who actually felt the need to explain to me — as if I had no idea, and you know, haven’t been doing what i do for as long as I have — the demographics and general needs and practices of people who blog about sexuality. I don’t have diva moments often (which is a big part of why i stopped studying opera in high school), but as I read the missive over here, an audible gasp issued from my mouth (which made me sick of myself quite instantly), and I just couldn’t even make myself respond back. I mean, there’s no way to say, “Umm, do you know who I AM?” that doesn’t sound prissy, pissy and banal. Regardless, and even knowing the stupidity of the way I felt at that moment, feeling valueless comes up again: you do something for a long time, starting before anyone else even does it, and sometimes, when you’re recognized in no way for it — it just makes you feel like shite.
Know what else? When people DO sell out, there is SO much noise about it. But when you really don’t, even over loads of time? When you bust your arse NOT to, and take the hard hits for not doing so? Ain’t a peep. And you know what? That freaking blows.
Usually, I’m pretty good at being positive in light of all of this kind of stuff and the daily crap I slug through. I’m no dummy, I know and understand why what I do is so often so unsupported, even though I don’t agree or — obviously — like it. But when you’re staring down at a stack of bills, looking at rent due a couple months away and not sure where it’s going to come from, needing some real healthcare and having no idea when you’ll be able to get it, eating peanut butter and jam too often for lunch, having a book you worked on for six years to promote but no cash to promote it with, piling stuff you love off to pawn, and envying the hell out of people who can go somewhere and take a real vacation while you’re harboring the heartbreak counseling yet one more sexual abuse survivor you really — however much of a shit you feel like for feeling this way — wish someone else was taking care of, it’s pretty easy to not only cease being positive, but to get pretty damn negative.
My new thing lately is to be out to dinner or drinks and if I’m with someone I feel even remotely close to, I just burst into tears for no reason, in public. That’s a winner. I’ve been avoiding seeing friends because I’m such a drag lately, and I kind of don’t feel like having to try NOT to be a drag: faking it just feels even worse, and when I talk about this stuff, I usually wind up with a) a bunch of earnest trying-to-help that are usually all ideas I’ve had and pursued, so I have to recount my failures, or b) a total silence, likely because no one knows what to say, which is understandable, especially since it’s pretty unusual for me to have my spirit so broken. Poor Mark has effectively been living with Sybil — if I’m feeling better, I try and just avoid this topic altogether, but if I’m low, or something brings it up, I just lose it and turn into a weepy pile of mush, on top of being critical with him about every damn little thing lately, because my threshold for anything else going wrong or getting messed up is so low, and because he’s one of the only people I feel even remotely comfortable losing it in front of. Lucky him! (Course, he just had his own personal breakdown in front of me last week, so it is a pretty mutual exchange.)
BAH!
I just wish I knew what the right thing to do was to get on the right track with all of this, instead of feeling so lost and so torn and so out of options. I wish I could magically change my attitude about it all, to boot, because I know that cannot possibly be helping the matter. Some days lately, I just wish I could say to hell with the whole lot of everything, pack up my dog, my cat and my piano, get our arses to Mexico or some nice farm land somewhere — and convince Mr. Price to join us — change my name and grow tomatoes until I kicked it: it’s a fantasy I entertain often, and quite enjoy entertaining. If I share that fantasy with others, the typical response was that I’d get bored in no time, feel useless and need to go do some activist work. While I think that would have been true about me at one point, I’m not so sure it is anymore: in fact, I’m becoming pretty certain that it isn’t, to the point that I almost resent the implication that I simply MUST do The Big Work. I’m tired, man, I’m world-weary, and if I’m going to scrape by on so little so much of the time, it’d sure be nice to do that without having to work so hard and juggle so much of everyone’s heaviest stuff.
(It felt very liberating to write that out loud just now, actually. That’s a load off.)
I’m not asking anything of anyone here (save your ever-wearying eyeballs due to this entry, and for that I apologize). In fact, right now, it’s pretty critical that I sort my own shit out without a lot of interference. Obviously, if anyone has any super-brilliant ideas they’re pretty sure I haven’t thought of, I’m all ears, so long as it’s understood that I may not reply back, especially if the super-brilliance is a road I’ve already gone down, or something that I just know won’t be workable (in which case my lack of reply isn’t about not being thankful for help or concern, but about not wanting to rehash nonoptions, because doing so bums me out more).
I just wanted to get this stuff on the table, both because I needed to for myself, and because I do expect to be a bit distracted with all of this until I come up with some solutions, so it may be quieter around here than usual. Plus, it felt pretty essential to just keepin’ it real around here. I will be fine — I will, even at those moments when I’m sure I won’t — lord knows, I’ve lived through worse than this and managed to be fine, and I do have some good supports. I’ll cry a lot, and — thank heaven for working alone during the day — raise my fists and yell at the air a lot, spend late nights singing sad songs on the piano a lot, hit my bag, make a lot of lists, and hopefully, I’ll think of and find something to put me and my work in a better position to sustain ourselves soon, in a way that I don’t have to compromise myself and which also isn’t temporary, but has some longevity so I don’t have to keep ending up back in this sort of a jam and this sort of malaise.
What I would be up for, though, if you’re of a mind to feel you ought to offer something when a girl is down, are really good stories about people fixing seemingly impossible problems. I’d prefer you not just make up a fiction, but I won’t say no to a fiction right now outright, either (plus, I won’t likely know the difference). Too, I am up for anyone who is able to connect me directly with a good (and brave) ‘net ad rep who can really serve it up for larger sites: given my numbers, that really does look like the best solution right now, and it shouldn’t interfere with 501c3 filing, either.
And I’d also not say no to anyone who felt the strong, pervasive need to ship me a bottle of silver Patron, a whole lot of non-dairy chocolate, the new Patti Smith CD (she just makes being depressed and pissed off seem so much more glamorous and cool), one-way tickets to Chiapas or Oaxaca and a good kick in the pants. Just sayin’.
June 28th, 2007 at 4:46 pm
I can’t offer any of the above. But I’m buying your book for my college-bound younger sister, who feels the sex ed she got was awfully inadequate (as was mine; I just read scarleteen a lot). I answer her questions the best I can, but I want to make sure she’ll be in good shape before college.
And when my book-buying budget has bounced back, I’m thinking I’ll get myself one too.
So other than telling people about the book, I wish there was something I could do, since your work really helped me, and by extension, helped my friends and sister, who I’ve been able to pass on info too.
June 28th, 2007 at 5:52 pm
Patti Smith CD:
Big check in that box. Covered. Next time I see you, it’s yours.
June 28th, 2007 at 5:54 pm
PS—one of the reasons you might be getting lots of inquiries about photo sessions in the twin cities is that your page on rates/details still says you live there.
June 28th, 2007 at 6:59 pm
Not sure if I can offer any words of hope or advice, but I am donating a copy of your book to my sister’s highschool library. It’s a private highschool so it actually has its own sex ed class apparently taught by a really good teacher. I made a suggestion to my mom once (she’s on the school board) that she should show the teacher your book and maybe have it be like, a text book for that class or something.
. . .. . .just a crazy idea, but if it ends up working out I’ll be overjoyed. Also, my hometown is Victoria and I’m sure you’ve probably already considered that for potential booksigning, but if not then would it be something feasable? It’s basically a ferry-ride away and though I couldn’t make head or tail of the fare rates or routes when I looked at their websites it’s got to be cheaper than a plane ticket . . .hmm. . that’s about all I know about the process, though.
I really hope things turn out for the better. This book deserves to be seen.
June 28th, 2007 at 8:58 pm
In terms of promotion on the cheap - could you team up with Planned Parenthood?
As for donors, there are a ton of millionaires where you are. It’s a shame you don’t have a board of directors out there shaking them down and getting them to join team heather.
June 28th, 2007 at 9:02 pm
Would a bottle of Milagro tequila do? It’s not quite as smooth as Patron, but it’s my personal favorite. I have limes. If you’ve got time Sunday, let me know. I might need to be out of the house for part of the day.
Chloe, that was my hope too! I bought a copy for my high school for that very reason.
June 29th, 2007 at 2:28 am
“Some days lately, I just wish I could say to hell with the whole lot of everything, pack up my dog, my cat and my piano, get our arses to Mexico or some nice farm land somewhere”
You know, I’m not sure what your options are and whether Mr Price could cope with putting stuff on hold for weeks, but I pretty much did this: walked away to where life was cheap and gave it a go.
Not as a retirement thing (I’m only your age!) but just a temporary measure. I did some silly jobs (favourite was working as a tour guide in Scotland but that was more luck than good management) and slept in some shitty beds and then went “back to real life” after a year.
I dunno, I don’t mean to make it sound simple. I was walking away from what I was doing, and it was still touch and go. You would be looking (I assume) to keep stuff going. But maybe use some of that “we know who she is” infamy to try to get information on options for self-financing retreats - a 6-week farm sitting deal in the wastes of Canada or transporting a car across the states. Maybe ask some of those teens who you are supporting for ideas, a lot more likely to think out of the box? See if you can get a break — not an all expense paid vacation but a step into a parallel world where you are just doing something totally different.
June 29th, 2007 at 3:43 am
I was inspired to write about accomplishing the impossible, or at least what seemed like it at the time: here’s my meager attempt. It’s not much, I’m afraid, and probably silly compared to other problems people face.
http://candyposes.com/archives/220
June 29th, 2007 at 5:41 am
You know, after knowing you (albeit online) for seven years now, I think what you need is to get out into the woods for a week or so. Grab a woman friend or two, go camping, connect with the natural world for a bit. Scarleteen is due for its summer break anyway, and the world won’t fall to pieces while you’re away– you, however, do need to not fall to pieces, and I think that you’ll find the energy you need in the soil and the trees. Not a long term solution to any of your worries, no, but it sounds to me like you need to step away from it all for a bit, as your first step.
June 29th, 2007 at 6:56 am
I’m sorry, this is another one of these constructive suggestions that probably wont be useful. I was just thinking of the scarleteen business model. It’s not literally the case that teens have no money - quiet the opposite. If they had no money, you wouldn’t have so much of big business selling their vision of sex and bodies directly to them. No the problem is that they have no money to spend online. That is, online sales are done through credit cards, and that’s not something teens have a lot of, and if they do, they’re not going to spend it on online sex-education. It’s a shame because if you could charge $1 each month from each of your readers (which is something that 98% of all teens could afford), you could be in a better financial situation.
OK, and you don’t want to undermine your work by accepting bad ads, and lots of advertisers are unwilling to advertise with you.
In some ways (don’t laugh) you’re in a similar position to people who write webcomix full time, like questionablecontent.net. By this I mean you’re providing something useful, but your audience is unlikely to pay a subscription fee, nor are they likely to pay a small amount per use. So what to do? Well, the author and writer of questionable content makes a living … selling related schwag. Seriously. He comes up with t-shirts that are related to his strip, gets pre-orders and then sells them. He actually does different designs and makes them as limited runs. His fans buy them (in part out of support and in part because they love the shirts) and keep him in business.
Teens love schwag. Not all teens can afford it, fine, they can read without buying. But the 70% of your readership that is willing to pay $10/year for a new t-shirt might be able to keep you in business. Here’s the hitch though - online sales are credit card sales. Teens can spend $10 at the mall easily. Can you capture those sales as direct sales? That’s harder. But it’s a lateral leap, and maybe … something you hadn’t thought about. I know you don’t have a lot of cash for initial outlay, but collecting pre-orders should help …
I’ll try to think of inspirational stories too. The ones I have are usually of people doing pointless things, like the guy who ran over 200 miles in a day. Inspirational, yes. Inspirational to you? Not so much.
June 29th, 2007 at 7:18 am
As per the comment above and for what it’s worth: hell, I’d buy Scarleteen t-shirts.
I’ll try to think about inspirational stories too.
June 29th, 2007 at 10:41 am
Quick thank you’s and responses before I head out to have a big fight with the weed whacker in the overgrown yard:
Rebecca, Molly: just thanks. And Molly, that seems to be the one page I missed updating locale info on: thanks for your eagle eye.
Chloe: that’s awesome. And I do want to do some promo in Victoria, and Sarah Mundy and I have been talking. But unfortunately, one hiccup in all the promo has been that Avalon was acquired by Perseus. Ultimately, from what I can tell, that’s good news, but it meant that my last publicity person got sacked, we’re shifting to a new one, so suffice it to say, my book promotion hasn’t exactly been top priority or managed as it would have been without this transition. So, for now, save what I can arrange myself, I’m still in limbo.
Zelig: for the whole time I have run scarleteen, I have extended every efort to Planned parenthood to team up with them, even just to run their PSAs for free, for us to try and share resources, but despite referring users to them daily, being very supportive of them, and having the same level of traffic, I’ve never been able to get so much as an email response in return, so I’ve very much given up on them. And yes: Micrisoft millionaires would be very nice to know.
Fish: yes, please.
Sylvia: if I didn’t have book promos and other arrangements (including a family visit in Chicago to my mother which is not something I can skip, as she’s ill) which kept me from doing so through Spetmember, yes, I could do that. But I also don’t know what’s scheduled afterwards, alas. I was, however, just last night telling mark I had a rare wish to be 21 again, because I used to do that sort of thing far more often then.
Candy: That was really awesome and not “not much” at all. Thanks, gal. And when I’m sutiable to be around company again, let’s do touch base again in terms of grabbing some coffee, okay?
Beppie: Agreed, and have been looking into just that for myself this week.
Zelig and Jessica: You know, for years and years we DID have t-shirts and the like, and a whole section dedicated to selling them, but I removed that section in the upgrade because they so, so rarely sold, and when they did, it was hardly ever to our actual userbase. Now, that might be because they were CafePress shirts — which are very limited in their styles and aren’t so hot — but doing anything else right now (and I have designs here that have been waiting around for the cash to do it with) would involve investing money to have made, and I don’t see this population pre-ordering. So, I’ve shelved new schwag until we’re in the financial spot to do it.
And yes: it is a pity to have the online sales barrier, because absolutely: even just ten bucks a year from all our users would go beyond solving the problem, it’d have us utterly, completely financially stable, since each user doesn’t actually cost us that much a year.
June 29th, 2007 at 1:02 pm
Heather - just one more clarification here - is there any way you could get a local board (or a national board) for Scarleteen? I have friends who have started up non-profits entirely from scratch and found boards simply by emailing people. It does mean giving up a bit of control, but one of the responsibilities of a board (which I was no good at as a board member) is to go out and shake the trees for donors.
If you had a few in Seattle, they might know somebody who knows somebody who was a MS millionaire. Donors are used to being asked for large donations (five and six digit), and for you a few four digit donations would make a huge difference. I know you don’t have the time to find them, but that’s indeed what a board is for.
As for the shirts, and I know I’m being pushy, would you be willing to experiment? Put up one of your designs and ask people for pre-orders. Get them done somewhere decent, the opening print run for t-shirts is only something like 500. If you get 500 pre-orders, even if you only clear $5/shirt, that would be $2,500 from that one trial alone. If it fails, you haven’t wasted either design time or cash outlay.
Lastly, are there any grantwriters who are willing to work with you on commission? There are a few public health grants out there …
And I apologize if I’m not helping. The gap between what is and what should be seems so small, I keep thinking there should be some way to bridge it, and if you’ve missed just one thing that actually works and we could figure that out, it would make a huge difference.
Lastly, I don’t have a problem with some forms of “selling out” if those forms are simply doing things that are commercially feasible rather than compromising the core of ones entire venture. I have friends who are artists who insist that they only want to do work that is guided by their personal artistic vision, and they don’t care what anybody else wants. I guess I don’t see it as being bad to do work that is designed to suit a client, work that listens as well as talks. In the same way, I can’t imagine that people should think you’ve sold out because part of what you do needs to be something that attracts a paying audience or a patron.
June 29th, 2007 at 1:03 pm
[Sorry, above if you don’t get enough orders, you return the money)
June 29th, 2007 at 2:26 pm
That sucks about your publicity person getting fired.
Hopefully after the transition, things will get straightened out and they’ll turn their attentions back to promoting your book?
Now I don’t know anything about promoting books but it seems like you can’t just jet off to anywhere and do booksignings, rather you have to get some kind of publicity about the book before you arrive in the area?
I dunno .. I still can’t give up the notion that it would (should!) be possible to get you up here for a book signing or maybe even some kind of book presentation at my sister’s school?
Just kind of crazy ideas, I guess, but the least I can do is talk to my mother about the possibility of it if you like. From my experience she’s really good at networking and organizing things.
June 29th, 2007 at 2:35 pm
Crazy idea #2. .
I wonder if you’d be able to find photo subjects in Victoria?
Or maybe do promotional photographic work on landscapes and gardens for various establishments? I know there’s a helluva lot of gorgeous gardens all over Victoria run by various foundations and such. Again, I’m not really sure how it all works as I’m no photographer, but . . just an idea.
June 29th, 2007 at 7:54 pm
this probably sounds nuts, but have you ASKED users to donate? i know there are banners on the site for donation, but i’m just wondering if you’ve directly asked users in a more specific way. more curious than anything else.
and if you want some non-dairy chocolate, i’m seriously your girl. email me.
June 29th, 2007 at 8:02 pm
{{{hug}}}
(no ideas~lots of good thoughts coming your way)
June 30th, 2007 at 7:27 am
Dear Heather,
My husband has been a reader for several years, and I’ve been an occasional reader. As a mom to a thirteen year old daughter, I support your work. There are far too many negative sexual models for young woman in the current cultural climate of the U.S. We have purchased your book for our daughter and placed it prominently on the book shelf and let her know that if there are any questions she might have, but is too embarrassed to ask her parents, it is a great resource. Right now she is still in the “Boys are yucky” phase, but I’ve no doubt that boys or girls will soon have an attraction for her.
I too am an educator, I teach high school. I don’t think that your desire to be back in the classroom is entirely unattainable. Public schools k-12 are obviously out because of your stated reasons, but universities, even local state or community colleges, often teach classes about human sexuality, and I think that you would qualify as an expert in that arena based on your work of the past eight years and your book. I’m not sure what degrees are required to work in higher ed in your area, but an adjunct position is a possibility based on your expertise perhaps? Just a suggestion.
June 30th, 2007 at 8:53 am
I don’t have any brilliance to add to the wonderful words you’re getting from these other lovely people- I just felt like it was important for you to know that some of your old friends are still out here, still hearing you, and still sending you lots of love and admiration.
I don’t know if it will help or not, but you have always been my hero, Heather, and when I was sick, it helped me to read your site and think “even though *I* can’t be out there and doing these things, she is, and I can sit here and root her on.”
I can’t do anything monetarily, but I can do my mojo thing, and I’m going to do a ritual on Monday for you in the hopes that it will light a fire under someone’s ass. *HUG*
–Kara
July 1st, 2007 at 1:17 pm
::hugs:: and happy thoughts headed your way. Count on a bottle of tequila from me when you come back to the Cities for my wedding.
July 1st, 2007 at 3:14 pm
Another crazy idea that you might have already explored, but: Have you ever thought about trying to find someone at the university to work with? When I was in college, I worked with a rape survivors group and a sexual health counseling group, and I’m sure that many of us would have been excited for a chance to do work in the community. Maybe you could find some volunteers who could take on some of the abuse counseling through a group like that, or a grad student (or even faculty member - there’s a lot of academic interest in online communities lately…) who could be interested in co-writing a grant?
In the financial arena, I’m going to buy a copy of your book as a back-to-school present for my now-college-age sister. I know that she’ll appreciate it as a reference, and hopefully some of her friends will decide that they want one too! I wish you a good new book publicist and as much tequila and chocolate and Patti Smith as makes you happy.
July 2nd, 2007 at 4:20 am
Hi ! Probably you’ve tried that already, but what about australian or european sponsors/ads ? they could see teen sex ed in a better light than americans. I am thinking european countries whose populations are fluent in english: scandinavian countries, holland, uk. Surely not Ireland, Poland, Portugal nor Italy, too catolic-narrow-minded.
Sadly, I can’t help you in Spain, since your book, scarleteen, etc are in English, and thats a barrier here. To the point that, even that I am waiting eagerly for your book from Amazon to show it to a friend of mine, teacher of teenagers, he probably will have problems with language, as well as his colleagues.
fwiw
Marta
July 2nd, 2007 at 7:31 am
This is a more long-term direction possibility - I wonder if you could provide workshop or retreat programs for (well-financed) adults and perhaps get enough from that to also support your service work to the teens. I thought of this because of a retreat center I attend, where people do personal growth work, and the income from that supports the staff members as well as a dog rescue on the premises that typically houses 60+ dogs and adopts out a few hundred per year. Dogs aren’t paying customers but they need the love, the medical treatment, the opportunity to keep their lives and find good homes. It isn’t cheap. The personal growth retreats bring in people who have the money to support the whole structure.
That’s not to say that it was easy. Staff tells their stories about the early days when they hadn’t figured out the financial planning and it sounds just as hard as you are struggling with… but they worked through it as a team and did eventually make it work. So, I bring up the idea of a sister program for adults because it might be something you could enjoy - which certaintly seems better to me than struggling with selling out. If you have interest in this route, I’d be happy to put you in touch with the staff of the program I attend, who would probably be happy to have a conversation with you about possibilities to support your dream. (The theme of our work this year is bringing dreams into reality - seems parallel.)
I realize this may not fit your needs, and that’s fine too - you know your environment far better than anyone else. So I wish you well no matter your direction, and hope you find YOUR solution in whatever form it comes.
July 2nd, 2007 at 7:43 am
Heather, as a long time reader of your sites i can only sigh at what a sick world it is when someone doing work as crucial and brilliant as yours has to struggle to get by, and yet so many nobodies can make a fat salary just by turning up for the 9 to 5.
Sparking off Marta’s idea, i believe that the climate here in the UK is much better for sex ed work, and our equivalent of Planned Parenthood, the family planning association, might be a better bet. Their website at fpa.org.uk includes an online store for sex ed resources, which seems to be mainly their own publications. There’s nothing available with the breadth of your book so it might be worth getting in touch with them to see if they’d promote it? I wish i had any contacts in retailing that might help but i don’t…. but if you think trying the UK market is a good idea, and there’s anything better done on the ground here, shout me and i’ll give it my best shot. As one of the 9 to 5ers on the cushy salaries, frankly it’s the least i can do.
July 2nd, 2007 at 11:29 am
Sister, do I ever understand! I spent three years supporting myself through sex work, and hoping to god it never came to light. I have been in the gay media for four years now, and they are *very* accepting of such checkered pasts as mine, as is the school I attend (Antioch, there is one in Seattle) for my psych masters and MFT. I have been very honest with my classmates about my past, and they have been overwhelmingly supportive.
I don’t think ads or such is selling out. I don’t think taking a job is selling out. Sometime life can’t meet all of our expectations/principles, but we can live by most of them, I find. It’s a trade-off. Our mag sells sex ads, as does LA Weekly. We sustain our free magazine (which is a very good one) partly on these ads. It’s how it is. I accept it, though I don’t dig it.
Heather, you are immensely talented and you are just one person. Take care of you. You deserve it.
You can always write some things for Frontiers! I need writers all the time.
July 2nd, 2007 at 1:37 pm
Random question, Heather: Is there a certain way to buy your book that benefits you more directly? For instance, I know that buying CDs at concerts gives the artists a better cut… is the same true for buying your book online or through an independent bookstore as opposed to Borders? Thanks!
July 3rd, 2007 at 4:46 pm
I just found your website a few months ago and really enjoy it. I logged on to read your latest journal post and was genuinely moved by your words. As someone who left a job teaching second grade in Baltimore MD. to teach GED classes in Harrisburg, PA. I understand the stress and heartbreak of scraping out a living from your passions. But after I read your latest journal entry I read the comments and then the cast and crew link. While your stress and fears about money are justified you, my dear, are wealthier than most; just read your own cast and crew link when you need a reminder.
July 3rd, 2007 at 9:25 pm
So sorry to hear this Heather. Have you looked into this
http://www.goodsearch.com/
I suppose it could be a total scam, but I don’t see any reason to doubt it is what it says it is, a way for charities to get a cut of the billions raised by search engines each year.
Most likely registering scarleteen with it would only be worth a hundred dollars a year which seems to be what a typical organisation gets. However, you might be a bit of an exception. If you could get a fair chunk of your users to make this their search engine then it might come to a bit of money - after all I imagine the people who use scarleteen are pretty heavy web users and do lots of searches.
I’m not sure if registering would require this 501c3 status or not, but with thousands of signed up organisations it can’t be too hard to get on their list.
July 4th, 2007 at 8:49 am
Awwwww…HeatherLove! I’m sorry about this conundrum… look at all this support you have and these lovely suggestions.
Mine would have been a lil’ bit redundant, I believe. Being a nonprofit, though, does reap so many benefits, from free software donations, to free…donations, period. If you come up with basic ideas and marching orders for volunteers, a wish list/checklist, and publish it here or send it out as a newsletter, you know that so many of us will catch you, grrrl! 
Hugs Deluxe,
Ji
July 5th, 2007 at 8:17 am
I have no great words of wisdom (and saw so many practical solutions offered already).
Just a hug and a thanks for being a friend (and for being an alternate version of a real, grown woman to so many girlkids out there, including mine;-).
My “perspective adjustor” (aka my very ill roommate) is back in the hospital, reminding me (again) that “standing upright and taking nutrition” is more than an idle boast some days.
Hope you can figure out a way to make it all work (while retaining your sanity;-).
(much love to you and all who support you;-)
July 6th, 2007 at 8:56 am
Okay, starting from the back of the room…
Christopher: Give Bruce and his little dog a hug for me. I’ll see you and Colee soon again, around labor day.
Jianda: Working on it. Regardless, we’ll get there.
Stephen: I’ll take a look for when there is $, thanks.
Marysia: Just thanks.
Alecia: Really, there isn’t. Buying it different ways basically nets different benefits. For example, buying it (and reviewing it!) at Amazon ups my rank which helps to increase my sales there. But then, asking bookstores who aren’t stocking it currently for it is another kind of helpful, because it gives them a weird social permission to have it, gets it out on more shelves more places, etc. Buying it from an indie bookstore helps everyone. Ultimately, there where of buying isn’t so much what helps most as is simply buying it, getting an extra copy to get into the library, and helping with buzz about it by posting reviews at booksellers and blogs. Bless for asking. Also, am starting to work on uni connections, yes.
Korina: I’m always up for more frelance work: I run out of money all the time, but I’m never out of words. So, just holler at me per what y’all need these days and I’m on it.
Kate: Good thinking, and yes, agreed: The UK climate is markedly better.
Jenny: Will have to think on that.
Kara: big love to you.
bflicka: You know, the one giant thing that keeps me out of even looking into that is having so many friends who work in higher academia, and not knowing a single one who doesn’t want to eat her own eyeballs from the stresses of the system daily. When I taught in schools before, the ONLY problems I ever had were with administration, and my impression is that the admins in earlier education are a cakewalk compared to in higher ed.
Kitchen: Yes, we ask. Often. Most of them just ignore those requests. One issue a lot of teens have in any context where adults are helping them, from what I can gather, is that they’re still enough in the parent/child mode that adults = people who owe them something. So, for a lot of them, seeing what we do as a favor, rather than as an obligation, is difficult.
Chloe: I’ll make a note of that, too.
Zelig: right now, the merch thing just isn’t a workable option. But the board-thing, for sure. That’s on my list to get started for this year already, and in fact, there’s really no reason it even needed to be local, so at some point, that is something I’ll bring to the broader table for interested parties.
Everyone: thanks again, even if what you had to offer was a hug or something that isn’t workable, it’s really kind that you checked in and left something. Hugs back.
July 14th, 2007 at 9:25 pm
Heather–
I’m a long-time reader as well–and a theater director and non-profit development person specializing in grant-writing. I suspect that something that could assist Scarleteen in terms of being able to receive grant money without having to go through the enormous headache of pursuing 501(c)3 status is an umbrella organization. There’s several out there that allow individuals and relatively small organizations to receive tax-deductible donations; for example, there’s one called Third Sector New England–social justice non-profits, and in New York, there’s NYFA (New York Foundation for the Arts), Fractured Atlas, and The Field, which are specifically for artists. Now, these organizations take a small fee, generally 5%, off the top of donations, but they process donations for you and take on the burden of a lot of paperwork. One or both of your lives, educational or artistic, could be covered under that kind of arrangement–and I know that Fractured Atlas offers discounted health care plans to artists. Just a thought, but I’d love to volunteer to help you out if you’re interested in trying to find something like that or need any grants written.
August 21st, 2007 at 6:51 pm
Hey Heather,
Sorry so slow to respond - I too am overwhelmed with (unpaid) projects. In particular, a ‘digital content festival’ that is partly aimed at helping people like us to find new ways to make a living based on Chris Anderson’s Long Tail ideas.
A couple of things that I thought might be helpful - http://BookTour.com - so your fans can register and find out when you’re speaking in their town (costs nothing for authors to register).
Also, there’s a great author-run marketing agency worth checking out, run by author M.J. Rose: http://www.authorbuzz.com/
How about the paid speaking circuit? You’re a brilliant speaker and have so much important stuff to say. There are quite a few agents for that, including small, ‘inde’ ones eg:
http://www.speakershome.com/ (although ouch that intro animation is painful!)
At my festival, we’re running some great workshops on things like Business Models for Digital Delivery, but since it’s in Australia I don’t expect you to attend
A lot of the resources are available online though - see links from http://bytemefest.blogspot.com/
Also, I’m finding networking site LinkedIn.com great for connecting with movers ‘n shakers, and of course Facebook and MySpace have made fan-wrangling a lot easier.
Have you thought about doing something for the mobile market? Eg sex advice for women. There’s a company run by women making content for women: http://limelife.com
I know you’ve thought about all these things before, and I know demands on your time make it really hard to step back and work out a strategy to commercialise without compromising what you believe in… but Heather, you’re SO worth more than you’re getting. You deserve to be living the life that your icon-status and long-term committed fanbase show you deserve.
Big hugs from down under, kat black =^..^=