Tiles and Golf and Dogs

Or how I abused sales calls for my own purposes, and fell in love again twice in a day

I’m taking a stab at blogging, see if I am able to resurrect my love of writing. I’d had a lot of dreams in my 30’s about writing a non-fiction comedy about my life. But a few things started getting in the way. Work. Meeting a man that turned out to be the man of my dreams (and sometimes nightmares when I see the kitchen after he cooks, but that’s another blog post). Covid. Becoming a de-facto stepmom to twin girls starting puberty (also another blog post). Losing my heart dog and gaining three dogs in exchange. My ADHD. Losing family to covid and cancer and losing friends to a freak house explosion. Getting engaged. Identifying too closely to Facebook videos about autism. My fiancee getting laid off. Him taking that as an opportunity to open a golf simulator bar.

Suddenly my entire world is upside down and inside out and I find myself busier than ever, with a work-related need to start up something I once had real passion for.

Writing.

This weird act of pouring my heart onto the page, typing away, the sound of the keys clacking like the sound of mahjong tiles shuffling. Clack clack clack. Pushing the words out of my head I can feel the pressure ebb and flow as my emotions flood out in a tidal wave of grief and release. This is what I always felt when I was writing as a teenager. Is it hormonal from the stress? I’m fairly sure it’s too soon for menopause, it can’t be those hormones. Is it all the typos because I can’t seem to slow down my fingers?

Whatever it is, its a cathartic and welcome feeling.

As a new business, we’ve been getting approached by an absurd amount of companies offering SEO services to us. Or my fiancée is asking for quotes. Hard to say for sure which is which. And true to myself, someone who spent years pinching my pennies and stressing over every grocery store run, I puke in my mouth a little bit at every sales pitch.

“Only 199 a month, this is a deal I can only give you right now. Normally we’d charge you over a thousand for these services”

That was the first person that we spoke with, before I understood what he was talking about. That kind of high pressure sales tactic always makes me question the seller. If you can’t give me that price unless I agree to it right now, without any time to consider or research what you’re telling me, there’s something wrong. You’re using urgency and fear against me.

Dude. That won’t work. I’m a bundle of fear and nerves already. We just started a business that we’ve gone 100% all-in on so I’m in a perpetual state of fear right now. Your urgency tactic is recognized and refused.

This penny pincher is going to do something insane instead. She’s going to dump an inappropriate amount of energy into this herself. She’s going to listen to every single one of those sales calls, pick out keywords those sales folks are saying. And obsessively look into them herself.

He told us “your website images need alt text.” I’ve kind of heard of this before but didn’t really understand it. I didn’t need to understand it. I work a remote corporate job that focuses on cars and managing operations, what use would I have for knowing that alt text is massively important for getting your website to have higher search ratings.

So I updated every image on our website with alt text. I shoved in every relevant keyword I could. Image descriptions like word salad.

“man in golf simulator club bar lounge mahjong house in city near me (proceed to list nearest 10 cities)”

Brilliant! I’m improving our website already! Amazing! I’m so smart!

But perhaps I should look up what kind of alt text works best and see if I did this well.

Whoa. No. Absolutely not. Not that kind of alt-text. Turns out word salad is heavily penalized by search engines and you actually need to write something useful instead. And search engines aren’t the only reason alt-text exists. Alt-text is used by the visually impaired to describe the image. It turns “image” into something a screen reader can describe to someone that can’t see it.

Ok, let’s write something descriptive about the PICTURE. But still try to make it pertinent to your business. Walk a fine line. Remember what alt-text is also used for, and it’s not just about search engines. It’s a really helpful tool for a business to improve their google rankings, but it’s also a tool for the visually impaired. It reads that description of the image so they can know what it is, get some context for it, instead of just hearing the web reader say, “image.”

So I immediately re-wrote every single one. I was an A+ student, I refuse to fail here.

“man in blue shirt with blue golf bag standing in front of golf simulator in Webster”

This one was a picture of my father, in a blue polo shirt, unaware that his belly looked a little soft under there. I decided to be kind and not mention that in the alt-text. I plugged the golf simulator, since that’s exactly where he was standing. And named the city the photo was taken in, since that’s where it was taken. You can see (or hear, if you’re using a web reader) the picture for yourself at www.teeduptx.com and imagine your own parent getting aggravated with you when they looked at what you put on your website for the whole world to see. He’s a nice guy, but he was NOT pleased with my photography skills. I’ll be kind to him and not tell you where it is on the site.

But that alt text description is chef’s kiss. You’ll know it when you see it.

Another day another sales call.

“for only 19.99 a day we can help improve your google rankings with alt text and backlinks-“

Was that the sound of a record screeching? That was when I stopped listening and started furiously googling “what is a backlink.” Thanks dude. I am unwilling to spend the equivalent of 4 Starbucks runs every day on something I can convince myself I can figure out.

A backlink is essentially every time your website gets mentioned somewhere else. Social media links shared with your website. Backlink. Reviews that mention your website, press releases mentioning your website, news articles with your website. Backlinks. Backlinks. Backlinks. Then there’s blogging.

Ahhhhh.

A backlink I might actually enjoy! Something I can do! I can write. I can tell myself that I can write. I can type really fast and with minimal editing and be satisfied with my work. I can try this!

First up, a quick “story” on our website. Remember, I haven’t written in a while. Not with any kind of volume since college, and hadn’t even had a chance to think about it since my 30’s ended a few years ago. I needed a little dip in the water. Just a toe, let’s see how this feels.

I wrote a quick little blurb about how much fun we had with a couple of customers over the weekend. One was my cousin’s wife, who I was able to teach Mahjong to while he watched UH basketball. The other was friends bringing their son to golf, and again, I had some time to play with the tiles. She taught me Siamese Mahjong and promptly destroyed my confidence.

But that little bit of writing, just a silly little customer interaction story, it was a lovely moment in my day. 10 minutes just telling a story to my computer. I needed that. A few minutes to focus on something other than the fear of starting a new business. I got to spend my brainpower on a creative act I forgot that I enjoyed.

Which brings me back to my man. I said he was the man of my dreams, and sometimes my nightmares. He’s the source of so much joy and love in my life, and the source of some of my deepest stresses. This terrifying business venture we’re taking is his idea. The whole reason I have to write now, to make a blog, to work on promoting our business. It was him.

He’s so different from me and so perfect for me.

I’m constantly worried about everything. I over think. I over plan. I quite literally make spreadsheet itineraries for cruise vacations we take. A cruise, where you get on a huge boat and don’t have to think. I somehow can over plan that, down to where I will eat breakfast and what time I plan to go to the hot tub. It’s on a spreadsheet I print out and make copies of. I worry about everything. What if the great dane eats too much onion because the kids leave dinner on the counter? What if someone drunk crashes into his car when he goes out to play poker late at night? What if this business is a horrible decision and we lose everything? What if we made a mistake?

He’s approaching this all differently. He isn’t afraid of failure. He is so confident that even if we fail, we’re going to be fine, we will figure out how to press forward. He doesn’t stress over it. He knows that he can work through problems when they come up.

He can talk through the what ifs with me when I really need it. He grounds me when I spiral. He hugs me when I feel like my body will explode. He’s not the most emotionally intelligent man, but he recognizes when I am losing it and brings me flowers and reminds me that we’re going to be ok as long as we’re together.

He’s right. Even if we fail, and the business fails, and we lose everything. We’ll be ok. We’ll still have each other and we can figure it out together. I might not get to buy that $500 set of boutique mahjong tiles, he might have to sell the golf simulators. It might get really tough, we might have to move, we might have to completely upend and restructure our lives. But he reminded me that it’s OUR lives. We’re in this together. I’m not doing this alone.

A question I asked earlier, what is this feeling I’m having as I’m writing? All these emotions pouring out. Is it hormonal? Is it all the typos because I can’t seem to slow down my fingers?

I think maybe it’s love. Maybe it’s me rediscovering a long dormant passion while I write about this man that drives me insane, sobbing while I think about him squeezing me tight when I’m telling him all my fears. Snot dripping out my nose, wet tears making my cheeks itch.

It’s love.

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I hope you enjoyed this as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hear my bed calling out, reminding me to go settle into the comfort of being held by the man I hope to live out my grayest years with.

-Farah-