What is work, anyway?

And embracing the unconventional choice

It’s been two weeks since my daughter started kindergarten, and people are already asking when I’m returning to work.

A sliver of me is flattered, because it implies that I was a competent freelancer who had a reputation for delivering high-quality work on time at a fair market price. Yet I’m already dreading the awkward silence that follows my answer while preparing a monologue about the bag of hot air sold to the modern woman.

Of course you can run a six-figure business while volunteering for every school event and packing nutritionally balanced lunchboxes and managing their calendar while keeping your house looking like the cover of Architectural Digest—and by the way, you should really make time for self-care and a hobby or three.

So after months of inner turmoil over this very same question, I’m glad I spent the summer to celebrate our accomplishments as a family and reflect on my roles as a mother, spouse, and writer. My daughter told me the other day that she adores her new school. My husband went through two startup acquisitions in the course of two years. I interviewed a lot of cool people. And in a plot twist I never expected, I started weightlifting—and now can’t imagine my life without it. And most important of all?

I learned (even more!) about the story in my heart that is dying to be told.

After spending the better part of the year immersing myself in plot structure, I realize that being a writer of color means accepting that my story won’t always fit into a tried-and-true method; and that it is more important than ever to:

1. Speak my truth, even in the face of backlash.

2. Cultivate a community of writers and artists that share that value.

The formidable Nguyen Phan Que Mai once shared that prior to publishing The Mountains Sing, hundreds of agents had rejected her manuscript, because her multi-point-of-view historical narratives were, and I quote:

Too complicated for whom? The people who believe Haitian immigrants are eating cats and dogs? The guy who yelled “Can you read?” when I briefly pulled up to a curb to return some DVDs to my local library—would he have said the same to a white woman presumed to be English-literate? For anyone who hasn’t read a history book about Vietnam’s thousand-year struggle for independence because the U.S. education system is reluctant to teach kids about a war they lost?

Is this the best we can do—ignore an author’s attempt to bring attention to life-altering personal experiences because the stories are too complicated?

So no, I have no immediate plans to return to work because writing this book is work. To use fiction as a medium for discussing inherited traumas of the second-generation, and how it interferes with the expectations of a modern life and society. To depict what interracial love looks like, because it’s 2024, and people still think I married my husband to gain access to his white privilege. The more that I navigate this world, as a citizen and the parent of a biracial child, the more alarmed I become about the greed, hatred, and ignorance that inhabit both sides of the political equation.

If I can make even the tiniest ripple of impact with the stories I tell, then it would be worth the lifetime spent trying to plot and perfect them.

Of course, even the loftiest goals will invite a plethora of opinions, good and bad. So I’m curious to hear from you:

What are some unconventional choices you’ve made and why? How did those choices affect your relationships with your family and friends?

Leave me a comment and let me know.

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Recently on The Write-Life Balance

Jessica McClain

and I recently enjoyed a luxurious kids-free lunch near her new healing space (Hopefully she gives us a virtual tour soon!) while our kiddos were at school, and it reminded me how much I’m enjoying my 37th year around the sun. In case you missed it, the link is below.

Gifts and presence 🎁

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September Links

🤖 Move over, ChatGPT! Perplexity is my tool of choice for call-and-response-type information summaries.

📓 After my local Paper Source kept running out of stock, I finally splurged for the Full Focus journal yearly subscription, aka the only journal I’ve completed multiple times.

🤣 Anyone who’s tried to learn Vietnamese knows that even the slightest variation in intonation can mean a completely different word!

🍃 As a life-long sufferer of atopic dermatitis, cold weather never fails to wreak havoc on my skin—and this soothing facial oil saves me every year.

🍎 We just finished processing 50 lbs. of apples from our trees into apple butter, streusel-topped pies and applesauce for future bundt cake and cider donut cravings. Any go-to recipes?

Happy Fall,

Sophia :)

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P.S. I’m giving myself space to get used to this new school schedule so updates will (probably?) be monthly til end of the year. If you want to talk before then, send me a message or book a call!