Back when I was first making the decision to quit practicing law and do, well, anything other than work in a law firm, I spent A LOT of time agonizing over what my "purpose" was. "If money was no object, what would you do?" I remember being asked, "what's your dream job?" I made lists of skills, conducted informational interviews, and basically checked off every task those "what color are your parachute" manuals suggested I do to help craft some kind of exit strategy and transition smoothly into career number two, whatever that may be.

Some of you may know what happened next. I wouldn't exactly call it a "smooth" transition into another career. After an all-consuming piece of litigation that sucked away two years of my life and started to transform me into a person I no longer recognized I walked. Quit. Nothing else lined up, no real savings to speak of, and a family that was most certainly dependent on two incomes.

I didn't have a choice. If I didn't leave then I would have to commit to a partnership at the firm and the work, both physical and emotional that would go along with it. Any hope I held to a career doing anything--writing most of all--would be relinquished, likely for good. Yes, my family would have a comfortable life, and yes I'd achieve a degree of success that many of my peers would envy. But it would be a cold, hollow achievement and no amount of money would make up for my absence when in trial. So yeah. I walked.

Did you know I've got some pretty amazing timing? About 3 weeks after I quit my job the economy tanked? All those informational interviews and freelance leads dried up in a matter of days. And here I was, with nothing but time on my hands now having to figure out what I was going to do with my life.

Those first few months were a flurry of writing, of actually taking the time to hone my thoughts and carve out this little corner of the internet as my own. I embraced my identity as a mother, as a feminist and made it fodder for my blog. Hegemommy was born and I had found my purpose. Here I was focusing my time into motherhood first and a specific, linear career path second and all of a sudden I was slammed with work. Once I launched Hegemommy it was clear that I was here to parent, publicly, from an understanding that motherhood was a political act and someone needed to talk about it.
.