I never accomplish everything I’d like to get done.  And, as a freelancer, I have no one to blame but myself.  I don’t have coworkers and bosses reminding me daily about deadlines like a 9-to-5 employee does.

Therefore, if I starve to death, that’s my fault — and I don’t like starving.

But I have a solution.

Over the past month, I conducted an experiment that was intended to improve not only my productivity, but the productivity of several other Baltimore-based freelancers.  And, after only four weeks, its benefits have already outweighed our initial expectations.

Here’s what we did, and how it might also help you.

The Premise:

For me, any tasks that don’t literally pay the bills are “optional,” AKA “whenever,” AKA “probably never.”

But I also know that I work best under pressure.  So it was time to invent some.

To do that, I approached several local freelancers and pitched them on a simple idea:

Let’s be accountable to each other.

The Process:

Each week, I met face-to-face with my freelance peers, one-on-one.  We’d discuss our business goals, our “must-do” work, and then identify any optional tasks we’d like to accomplish in the next week.

Then, each of us would then make a list of our own goals for the week, as well as the other person’s goals.  One week later, we’d meet again and see how we did.  (And if anyone needed a reminder, a nudge or a mid-week check-in, we could DM each other on Twitter and keep the ball rolling.)

Since the only penalty for not accomplishing our own goals would be the embarrassment of inventing excuses meant to convince a near-stranger that we were busier than expected, I presumed the absurd guilt involved in such an exchange would keep the participants honest (and motivated).  After all, why lie to someone who isn’t affected either way?

And I was right.  But, along the way, we all learned something else completely unexpected.

The Participants:

Initially, I only wanted one partner for this experiment.  I figured one hourly meeting was all the time I could spare.

But when four different freelancers took me up on my offer, I decided to involve all of them, but still meet them one-on-one.  That way, I could compare and contrast each person’s challenges and workflow, while mine would (presumably) remain constant.

My collaborators in this experiment were:

• Katrina Wagner, graphic designer ( @graphicbeans )
• Nicholas Critelli, photographer ( @critelliphoto )
• Molly White, social media consultant ( @mollywhite )
• Daniel Waldman, marketing / PR consultant ( @danieldubya )

We’re all self-employed, we all battle periods of distraction and aimlessness, and we live our days sandwiched between the rush of deadlines and our own long-term life goals.  We’re busy, but we each needed a voluntary reason to stay focused.

So we started relying on each other to keep ourselves honest.

How It Went:

In my very first meeting, Katrina laid out 5 goals she wanted to accomplish in the following week.  That number was arbitrary; some people only committed to one goal a week, others to more, but no week’s total was ever more than 6.

NOTE: Since I was meeting with people 4 times each week, I kept my own stated goals consistent from person to person.  Otherwise, I’d be making myself responsible for 20 different goals each week, and I’d fail spectacularly.

The first week, I accomplished everything on my list.  My fellow freelancers performed nearly as well, with only a few missed goals in total.

However, the following week, each of us hit a stumbling block.

Personally, I over-committed myself when compared to the amount of free time I ended up having (because I was traveling for 5 days that week).  Others had unexpected family commitments, client complications or new business opportunities that required more time than they’d anticipated.

This setback was actually a bonus, because it prompted each of us to think more critically about how many “minor” tasks we could realistically expect to accomplish alongside our recurring obligations.

Each of us continued to experience our own peaks and valleys of productivity over the following weeks, but we made a point of meeting (or calling) weekly to stay in touch, even if we were slightly off target.  (That way, even if we fell short, we had to own up to it.)

What We Learned:

In the end, I accomplished 11 tasks that I probably would not have completed otherwise.  These ranged from the mundane (backing up old projects stored on my various hard drives) to the opportunistic (getting a month ahead on client blog posts).

Surprisingly (and somewhat embarrassingly), the tasks I tackled took far less time to complete than I’d originally expected.  (One dreaded task took four whole minutes to complete.)   Once I realized this, I felt like an idiot for having postponed so many of them for so long.

For me, the biggest tangible benefit came in the last week, when I finally created my own a daily work schedule.  To do this, I listed:

• my hourly client obligations for each month.
• any recurring tasks (i.e., “editing video,” even if the hours differ monthly)
• any recurring personal tasks (writing this blog, walking the dog, etc.)

Then I broke my week down to hourly blocks and scheduled ample time for each task.

The results stunned me.

I discovered that I have more than enough time to accomplish everything on my list each week.  In fact, if I stick to the schedule I’ve created, I’d even have free time every day.

So where had I been going wrong?

Simple: misunderstanding my time was causing my to mismanage my time, and that drove me into the arms of distraction.

Until this week, I’d been tackling new tasks as they came up, or delaying them under the presumption that I’d have “more time later.”  But once I plotted my obligations against my available time, everything fell into place with time to spare.

And yet, the most interesting benefit of this exercise had nothing to do with efficiency.

What We Were Surprised to Learn:

Along the way, each of us learned a lot about one another’s businesses — and our own.

Hearing someone else’s challenges, exploring their solutions and offering our own suggestions all combined to get each of us thinking differently about how we solve our own problems.

For example, Nicholas told me about his complex system for backing up client files.  I mentioned some of his observations to Katrina, who (coincidentally) had experienced a computer crash the week our experiment started.  She thought her own system for backing up files could use some improvement.  I related both of these anecdotes to Molly, who suggested Katrina should try a service called Dropbox.  I passed that information along to Katrina and Nicholas, and now all four of us are using it.

And while that exchange may not have crossed anything off anyone’s to-do list, it’s information and experience that we wouldn’t have shared if we hadn’t sat down to discuss our businesses with like-minded strangers in the first place.

Summary:

Based on my wrap-up discussions with each of my collaborators, here’s what we’ve taken away from this experience:

–  We each accomplished tasks over the past month that we would have ignored otherwise.

–  We learned while discussing our businesses, and got valuable feedback on our choices.

–  We enjoyed offering helpful suggestions based on our own “outsider” perspectives.

–  We’ve each begun thinking about our businesses in new ways.

–  We have a better understanding of our priorities, and a clearer idea of where our time is spent (or wasted).

Moving forward, we now intend to meet monthly, as a group, and continue to share our observations and solicit each other’s advice.  We’ll also be sharing a web-based project management system, where everyone can post his or her weekly goals and check in to see how everyone else is doing.

And if one of us is falling behind, now we have four people to help pull us ahead.

So… who’s keeping you honest?

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In response to my blog post about popularity vs. relevance, Gradon Tripp mentioned his own quandary: he’s not sure if “being himself” is costing him money.

This is a doubt we all suffer on a regular basis.  Social media is supposed to be freeing and profitable, so we do our best to split the difference.  This means we’re forever studying our own public behavior to ensure that we’re being “professional enough” and “personal enough” at the same time.

But what if the real dichotomy isn’t “personal vs. professional”?

What if it’s “personal vs. practical”?

The Truth Is Only Half of the Story

You don’t get far in life without solving problems — first your own, then someone else’s.

The more problems you can solve, the more relevant you are, and therefore the more popular you become.

But not all problems are created equal.  Some are a problem of function, and some are a problem of perception.

When I recently tweeted my take on the vicious cycle of how Baltimore’s crime rate drives affluent workers (and their tax revenue) to the suburbs, resulting in budget shortfalls that force the city to cut police jobs, Dave Troy insisted that my view was inaccurate.

But whether or not my view is flawed, that’s only half the story.

The full story is Baltimore’s economic issues + people’s perception of Baltimore’s economic issues.

You can fix one and still have a problem with the other.  But you can’t fix both simultaneously.

So which would you choose to fix?

That depends on your personality.

Plumbers vs. Jugglers

Some people are plumbers.  They fix tangible problems.

Some people are jugglers.  They fix aesthetic problems.

You wouldn’t hire a plumber to entertain you, and you wouldn’t hire a juggler to fix your pipes.  One is good at improving function, and one is good at altering perception.

The problem with social media is that we’re led to believe we can do both.

I’m not so sure that’s a wise plan.

Let’s Be Reductive.

What’s the primary reason someone should pay attention to you?

What’s the secondary reason someone should pay attention to you?

Break your work down to an adjective and a noun, and you’ll get your answers.

Are you a “witty instructor”?

A “perverse artist”?

An “opinionated guru”?

The noun is what you do; the adjective is who you are.  Combined, they’re what you bring to the table.  Make sure they can coexist.  (Does anybody buy from an “opinionated salesman,” or hire a “slacker photographer”?)

You can be great at what you do, or you can be great at who you are.  Figure out which half of the equation you choose to define yourself by, and proceed accordingly.

You Can’t Be All Things to All People

If Baltimore has economic problems and perceptual problems, they need a plumber and a juggler.

Maybe Dave Troy is a plumber, and he’s focused on fixing Baltimore’s tangible problems.

Maybe someone else is the juggler who can teach people to see Baltimore differently.

But expecting one person to do both is asking too much.

What do you offer that someone needs?

Why should people care about you?

Because that’s what you should do.

And nobody needs a juggling plumber.

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Several weeks ago, Baltimore-based users of LinkedIn had a problem: LinkedIn insisted that Baltimore didn’t exist.

More specifically, LinkedIn classified anybody living in Baltimore as living in the “Washington D.C. Metro Area.”

Considering Baltimore is constantly trying to remind the world that it’s a separate city from D.C., some local Baltimoreans understandably perceived this LinkedIn hiccup as a minor identity crisis.

So they formed a (seemingly informal, as far as I could tell) group called “We’re From Baltimore, Hon!”  [If you've never been to Baltimore, "Hon" is their local variation of "Dear."]  The group’s long-term goal was to create a separation between Baltimore and D.C. in the LinkedIn database.

Evidently, it worked.

This week, I received an email from the group’s manager…

… explaining that all I had to do was re-enter my exact same zip code and LinkedIn would now recognize me as a Baltimorean, rather than a D.C. citizen.

Suddenly, Baltimore’s back on the map — literally.  Not bad for a ragtag group of motivated LinkedIn users.

And kudos to LinkedIn for actually listening.  For all the complaining we social media types tend to do about companies and services mistreating its customers or ignoring their suggestions, it’s nice to know that change really can happen when people commit themselves to doing the smart thing.

Last Thursday, I attended the fifth installment of Ignite Baltimore, an event designed to get people excited about creating positive change in Baltimore.

And yet, somehow, the experience had the exact opposite effect on me… and this got me thinking about HOW we talk about the things we most care about, and why we might want to change our approach.

How an Allegedly Inspirational Event Turned Me Into a Loathsome Beast

Ignite is billed as a rapid-fire salon of ideas, in which a dozen speakers talk for 5 minutes (and 20 Power Point slides) about a subject they’re passionate about.  For the most part, the presentations on this night were somewhat insightful, occasionally incoherent, but mostly harmless.

And then something happened that I’m still trying to process, because it altered my perception of reality.

15-year old environmental activist Hannah Freedman took the stage and delivered an eloquent, well-rehearsed, mildly convincing argument for the importance of youth activism.  I was impressed by her chutzpah, and I was clapping at all the times when I was supposed to be clapping.

And then I noticed the body language of the couple in front of me.

Slumped.  Stoic.  Slightly pained.  They looked as though they wanted to be anywhere but here, and they projected a stark resentment of everything Hannah — and, by extension, Ignite itself — stood for.

This momentarily irritated me, and I thought about reveling in my ethical superiority for being able to appreciate something as fundamentally galvanizing as youth activism.

But then I tried something different: I adopted (what I presumed was) this couple’s point of view.

I sat there, slumped and indifferent, to see how it would feel to resent a teenager for having the temerity to care about her own future.

I found it alarmingly easy to do.

In fact, the only more alarming part was how hard it was to shake that point of view.

When Hannah concluded her speech with something like, “Because we are the future, and you can either complain about it or you can help us,” I almost shouted something at the stage, Joe Wilson style.  That’s when my girlfriend realized she’d have to psychologically restrain me for the rest of the event.

All night long, I found myself unable to resume my traditional worldview.  Anytime someone took the stage, I implicitly rejected their claims as false because they didn’t jibe with my newly-adopted values of capitalism and protectionism.

I started to hate the arts, the government and people in general.

I refused to smile or applaud.  My girlfriend Ann and our friend Maya, seated on either side of me, went from being annoyed at my behavior to being angry at my obviously negative judgment of the event, concerned that I might ruin it for someone else.

Even Dave Troy, who’s well-known as a tireless cheerleader for Baltimore’s future (and who was sitting directly in front of me) moved a few seats away.  Granted, that could have been due to any reason, but I can’t help but feel that my aural negativity drove him to seek shelter.

My Newfound Hatred, in a Nutshell

My visceral reaction to the night can be summed up by a recap of the presentations.

Of the 13 talks delivered:

• 4 of them either directly or indirectly urged attendees to fund the arts
• 2 of them urged adults to take children seriously
• 1 of them urged attendees to donate to Haiti
• 1 of them urged attendees to donate used cell phones to Africa
• 1 of them urged the creation of a federal Department of Peace
• and 1 of them explained how Wolverine embodies the American ideal

As a social liberal and fiscal conservative, I would normally have appreciated the pluck of the presentations, even if I would have doubted their ability to make a damn bit of difference.

But on this particular night, thanks to my newly aggravated and seat-slumped soul mates, I left the auditorium irate at the audacity of the speakers.  Namely:

• If the arts are so important, why can’t they MAKE MONEY without begging me for it?
• If MORE government is the solution to anything, I’ll eat my hat.
• If dying Haitians and Africans need help, why don’t they just GET JOBS?
• If kids are our future, why can’t they prove their merit without COMPLAINING?

In short: stop telling me why I should care about your problems; SHOW ME WHY IT’S RELEVANT TO ME.

BE RESPONSIBLE.

PROVE THAT YOU’RE DOING YOUR BEST, and maybe I’ll feel like your cause is worth my time / effort / resources.  (But, honestly, probably not, because I work hard for my money and I’ll never warm to the idea of you begging me for a handout.)

Nonetheless, MEAN SOMETHING to me, and maybe I’ll care.

(And for fuck’s sake, Wolverine is Canadian.)

So… About Last Night…

Needless to say, I woke up feeling “normal” again on Friday, but it still took me a few more days to wrap my head around why I was so upset on Thursday.  And I think it boils down to the following:

• I cannot believe how easily I adopted a POV I normally reject as inhumanely self-centered.
• That kind of ingrained resistance to change is addictive.
• Hating everything didn’t make me feel better about myself, but the alternative didn’t make any sense either.  Thus, I was trapped in an illogical whirlpool of loathing.

All of which made me realize that liberals will never be able to convince the conservatives of the world that liberal ideas are valid because conservatives and liberals don’t even see the same reality.

If two sides can’t agree on the facts, their shared needs and the benefits of the most likely outcomes, there’s no hope for “bipartisanship,” much less a civil discussion of what we as a country (or a city) need in order to prosper (or even survive).

So, as a way to make up for the karma I likely burned during my Thursday night shitstorm, here’s my morning-after pitch on how we (usual) liberals can better bridge the gap between what we think matters and what everyone else thinks is important.

3 Ways to Keep the Haters From Dismissing Your Worthless Ideas

1.  Stop treating the arts like a helpless, valueless charity. The arts have been around for as long as we’ve been civilized.  But to hear modern arts professionals explain it, the arts will shrivel and die unless bleeding heart patrons (and our own tax dollars) can keep them on life support.

If the arts aren’t at least partially self-sufficient, no amount of hand-wringing will convince the people holding the purse strings that they’re worth supporting.

Here’s a secret: no one wants to invest in something that doesn’t believe it can survive under its own power.  People are funny; once a charity or an artist proves it can keep itself alive no matter what, we’re more inclined to support it with our own donations because it respects itself.

Begging?  Never sexy.  And if you believe that opera, theatre, live music and visual arts are sexy and life-affirming, you need to start by affirming your own will to live.

2.  Kids: Stop Talking Down to Your Parents.

Listen, I know we live in a fucked-up culture where the opinions of 14 year-olds are more highly-prized than the opinions of 65 year-olds because those 14 year-olds have access to more disposable income than the Medicare generation does.  But just because we who market products to children tell kids that we value their opinions, that doesn’t mean we really do.  At least, not beyond the ways in which their opinions can be exploited to make us rich.

If you’re under the age of 22 and you want to change the world, be my guest.  The world could use a good sprucing-up.  But you won’t get there by admonishing the adults for ignoring you, because the fact is, adults ignore everything, including their own consciences and common sense.

Revel in your youth.  Then do something.  We like to say “actions speak louder than words” because, like most cliches, this one is always true.

3.  Lead by example.

One of the best presentations of the night, even despite my hate-induced stupor, was delivered by Ellen Worthing.  It was about “bushwacking,” the art of (literally) going off the beaten path to discover something all your own.  In Worthing’s case, she detailed her frequent excursions into the bowels of Maryland, aided by her GPS unit and a suspicion that something more interesting was “out there.”  And she was usually right.

Ellen’s presentation filled the audience with admiration for her rugged individualism.  She tacked on an obligatory “follow your own path” generalism in her last slide, as a way of making her presentation about “us” instead of just her, but it was unnecessary; by showing us what she was capable of, she ignited more inspiration in her 500 listeners than anyone else did all night.

And, best of all, she didn’t ask anyone for money.

In Conclusion…

I’m sure Ignite Baltimore got a lot of people talking, which is the whole point.  (Technically, the whole point should be getting people to take action, but that’s a little too optimistic for a $5 event with a cash bar.)

And maybe the ideas people absorbed that night will get them moving.  Maybe some old cell phones will get donated to medical workers in Africa.  Maybe a few more people will pay for a night at the opera, or will venture out to an art event they might otherwise have ignored.

But if we really want to ignite Baltimore and get people moving in a positive direction, what we need are more people who lead by example and fewer people trying to guilt the public into a handout.

Because the only thing more addictive than doubting the relevance of everything is being inspired by seeing someone else exceed our own pessimistic expectations.

* If you’ve ever seen an episode of The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, you know what I’m talking about: anytime Will Smith’s friend (and real-life DJ) Jazzy Jeff says or does something inappropriate, Uncle Phil bum-rushes him out of the house, limbs flailing.

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Last night, while I was conducting a Social Media 101 workshop at Baltimore’s Creative Alliance, my Twitter account was hijacked… by my girlfriend.

I’d logged in on her laptop before the workshop began, and then I forgot to logout.  Since she’d accompanied me to the workshop, she suddenly found herself with two free hours to masquerade as me, and I’d be none the wiser.

Fortunately, Ann has no reason to dent my reputation by making offensive or controversial statements in my name.  Instead, she has a wicked sense of humor, and she started offering play-by-play commentary on my presentation style.

After awhile, she switched gears and started offering “fun facts about Justin,” which then morphed into a #funfactsaboutjustin hashtag.

And while anyone who didn’t see Ann’s original tweet probably thought it was bizarre that “I” would be tweeting about myself in the third person, my friends and my familiar Twitter conversationalists got a huge kick out of it because they were suddenly privy to a side of me that they wouldn’t otherwise see: me, as explained by someone who knows me a little too well.

Then, in order to illustrate a point, I pulled up my Twitter account during the presentation.  Ann’s cover was blown.  And the audience (and I) got a handy reminder that you should always log out of your personal accounts when you’ve accessed them from a public computer.

Afterward, I finally had time to read back through what “I’d” said, and see what others said in response.  It was entertaining.  And (mostly) true.  And surprising, because I never would have expected so many people to be so interested in the arbitrary details or commentary about my life…

… and yet, that’s what I already share with the world on a daily basis.

It took me awhile to realize that what Ann had been saying in my name isn’t all that different from what I already say myself.  But she was able to offer a slightly different viewpoint that I wouldn’t (or couldn’t) have provided because… I’m me.  And because she channeled her commentary as me, the people who follow me got to be in on the joke in a way that wouldn’t have happened if Ann had tweeted from her own account (which she doesn’t have).

I’m happy to have my own account back, but I’m also thankful for my out-of-twitterbody-experience.  Not many people get to attend their own funeral, but hearing what they have to say about you (or as you) is priceless.

Now all we need to do is convince Ann to rejoin Twitter (which she quit years ago), and then I can patiently await the day when she leaves her account logged in on my laptop…

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As you may have heard, the Mid-Atlantic US (in which I currently live) got hammered by a massive snowstorm this weekend.  Weather reports had been sensationalizing the potentially apocalyptic effects of the storm for days, warning that we could see a record snowfall and complete paralysis of city functions.  And if you doubt that people still take the media seriously, you should have been in any east coast grocery store on Thursday night: everything was wiped out.

Saturday morning, Ann and I awoke to the full brunt of the destruction.

Rufus needed his morning walk, and there was no way around it: we had to go outside.  Armed with a shotgun, a lantern and a blowtorch, we opened our front door with a mix of soul-rending trepidation and a sudden resurgence in our childhood beliefs in God — because when the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse arrive wearing ski masks, you can never be too careful.

Amazingly, all the buildings on our block were still standing.  The cars had not caved in beneath the mountains of precipitation.  There were no sirens, no wailing children trapped beneath the rubble, and no marauding gangs of anarchists raping and pillaging the survivors.

So we dug a little walkway midway down the block so Rufus would have a place to poop.

Then we went back inside, and we turned on the news, and IT WAS INSANE.  Somehow, the same morning news anchors who are on TV every week had managed to get to the station!  Neither of them looked like they’d had to cannibalize their loved ones in order to get out of the house. In fact, one of them was laughing at a picture someone had sent in of a dog in a snowsuit.

HOW WAS MASS COMMUNICATION STILL WORKING??? WE WERE SUPPOSED TO BE PARALYZED!!!

Too confused to function, we went back to bed, mostly to conserve our strength in case we needed to light flares on the rooftop later and help guide the evacuation planes.

But by noon, we once again ventured outside (this time with only a pistol and a hatchet, in case we needed to run) and discovered that our neighbors were not only not dead or eating their own young, but they were shoveling out their stairways, sidewalks and cars.  They were even talking to each other, which never happens.

By this afternoon, a full 24 hours after we were supposed to have borne witness to the final sub-arctic battle between good and evil, Ann and I were digging our car out from its snow tomb and romping in the park with our dog.  Other neighbors were sharing shovels and helping one another chip away at their icy vehicles or sidewalks.  Our next-door neighbors, who never speak to us, even managed to find the time to blatantly ignore us while walking past us!

If they have time to be petty and vindictive over perceived slights, how much of can Armageddon could this possibly be?

And that’s when it hit me:

We got through it.

The world was supposed to have ended (at least by modern meteorological standards), but it didn’t.  Somehow, despite all advertised odds, we were all still functional.  One guy was even going to work, which is as American as you can get during a crisis of biblical proportions.

And that got me thinking…

The country was supposed to have collapsed during eight years of Bush tyranny.  But we got through it.

The country could have collapsed during our current financial meltdown.  But we’re getting through it.

And Obama could still turn this nation into a socialist collective, unless the GOP outwits him and turns it into a fascist dictatorship first.  But we’ll probably get through that too.

In fact, there’s never been anything that’s happened in this country — and, in broader terms, on this planet — that the bulk of us haven’t gotten through.

Yes, we’ve had disasters and war and terror and plagues and homicides and genocides and secessions and depressions.  Yes, we’ve been inconvenienced and had to sacrifice.  Yes, we’ve abused and taken advantage of.  And yes, we’ve been trained to believe that things can only ever get worse.

And yet, regardless of what life throws at us, we’ve always gotten through it.

Which, finally, makes me wonder one last thing…

What If We Didn’t Spend Our Entire Lives Worrying About “What Might Happen?”

If we weren’t always petrified about rain, snow and murder, our local news would have to find something else to report.

If we weren’t entirely convinced that one of our political parties was going to drive our 200-years-young nation to ruin, our national news (and, perhaps, our politicians) would have to find something more useful to do.

And if we weren’t perpetually preoccupied with our immediate concerns about our own health, wealth, relationships and social standing, we might actually find the energy to move forward in the direction we’re so certain someone or something “out there” is preventing us from reaching.

In the end, what prevents us from being amazed at our own resiliency is just how commonplace the act of survival really is.  The world isn’t perfect, and neither are we, but we always manage to find a way to scrape by — and sometimes, we even make the future better than the past we grew up in.

Just ask your parents, or your grandparents, or anyone who’s fled to where you’re living now from a homeland they simply couldn’t bear to live in anymore; they’ll tell you that tomorrow has at least a 50% chance of being better than today, and unlike we modern cynics, they’ll believe it.

And if tomorrow happens to be worse than today?  Trust me:

We’ll get through it.

Whenever friends from Pittsburgh ask me how I’m adapting to Baltimore, I tell them the truth: Baltimore and Pittsburgh are so similar on so many levels that “adapting” hasn’t been necessary.  It’s more like I’ve just moved to an extremely remote Pittsburgh neighborhood, and now it takes me 4 hours to get to the nearest Crazy Mocha instead of 15 minutes.  (Also, people wear a lot more purple here.)

But there are significant differences between the cities, and it’s those “little things” that add up to one big problem: Baltimore has a negative self-image that impacts the way I, a new resident, choose to invest myself (or, more specifically, not invest myself) in my new home.

What Your Labrador Retriever Has to Do with the City’s Murder Rate

The most obvious difference between Pittsburgh and Baltimore is the latter’s epic homicide rate.  In 2009, Pittsburgh had 38 homicides (as of December 21), down from 73 in 2008.  In the same year, Baltimore had 239, up from 234 in 2008.  That’s 6 times as many murders in a city that’s barely double the size of Pittsburgh.

So what makes people kill other people?  And why are Baltimoreans so much more likely — or more willing, or more accepting of other people’s homicidal inclinations — to kill each other?

According to at least one analyst, it all boils down to Baltimore’s lack of a shared citywide identity.

The current issue of Baltimore’s Urbanite magazine includes an excerpt from Ohio State history professor Randolph Roth‘s American Homicide, which suggests that murder rates escalate when citizens lose faith in their social and political hierarchies.   If we no longer feel like the system we live in is fair, we don’t believe that respecting even the most basic rules will in any way improve our quality of life, so we’re more inclined to institute our own “survival of the fittest” mentality, pursuing what we believe is achievable rather than striving to “succeed” in a corrupt system.

All of which means that solving Baltimore’s homicide problem requires more than “just” tackling the issues of poverty, education or politics.  It requires that the people care enough about themselves and their city to redefine their own accessible future, together, and shape new politics and polemics around their own unified identity.

So what does all of this have to do with dog shit?

For Want of a Poop Bag, the Battle Was Lost…

I live in a neighborhood rife with dog owners, including me.  I walk my dog at least 5 times a day, and those jaunts give me lots of face time with the area’s sidewalks and tree boxes.

And they are, invariably, covered in shit.

As a random sample, I walked Rufus on Sunday afternoon and counted no fewer than 20 piles of dog shit left along the sidewalk in a 6 block radius.  Included among these roadside treats were deposits made in all but one of the tree boxes outside a nearby elementary school.  That’s right: out of nearly a dozen tree boxes located at the entrance to a gradeschool, all but one was home to a pile of shit.  Not one.  Not two.  All but one.

It says a lot about the character of a city when its people can’t be bothered to NOT leave steaming piles of dog shit at the doorway to their children’s schools.

Baltimore: Get Your Shit Together

Maybe I’m expecting too much of people.  Maybe because I clean up after my dog (and because it’s a law), I presume everyone else is naturally as interested in keeping their own neighborhood aesthetically pleasing (and free of health hazards).

Maybe I’m also being too reductive.  Surely a city’s societal woes can’t be encapsulated in the respect it shows to its own streets?  Perhaps I should look at other statistics, like Baltimore’s impeccable driving record.

Oh.  Never mind.

But don’t worry.  I get it.  I know life is hard and people are busy.  And maybe expecting you to take responsibility for what you do is elitist.  There is a recession, after all.  If it comes down to affording food or poop bags, I understand that feeding your kids trumps scraping your dog’s shit off your neighbor’s front steps.  We all have priorities.

But if you can’t clean up after your dog, don’t own a dog.  It’s that simple.  It’s about responsibility, accountability, leadership, good stewardship and being an adult.  It’s about understanding what you can handle vs. what’s beyond your grasp.

Most importantly, it’s about how you see yourself.

And as long as Baltimore continues to be a city that doesn’t mind being covered in shit, I’ll continue to be a resident who refrains from investing emotionally in a city that refuses to love itself.

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Yesterday, I explained why I think Microsoft sees its customers as idiots — an opinion that sparked a debate about the very nature of advertising.  Like politics, war and most other conflicts, advertising boils down to the challenge of convincing other people that YOUR worldview (or your client’s) is the most valid.

So does that mean we can save Detroit by rebranding it?

TIME magazine thinks so.  That’s why they’re sponsoring a major contest to rebrand the city, hoping it will cause Americans to see Detroit as something other than the crater at the bottom of the American dream — and to once again invest their time, money and talent in the region.  In short, TIME believes Americans should be proud to call Detroit home.  As Time, Inc.’s editor-in-chief, John Huey, wrote on October 5th:

“No city has had more influence on the country’s economic and social evolution. Detroit was the birthplace of both the industrial age and the nation’s middle class, and the city’s rise and fall — and struggle to rise again — are a window into the challenges facing all of modern America.”

Revitalizing the city is obviously a priority for the people of Michigan, as well as those directly affected by the area’s economic woes.  And that TIME is willing to take such an active interest in the region should be inspiring.  But judging by some analysts’ reactions to TIME’s efforts as “crazy and futile,” it seems that not everyone believes Detroit can — or even should — be resuscitated.

We Hate Me

As a former Pittsburgher and current Baltimorean, I can appreciate the uphill battle that once-great industrial cities must fight to rescue their self-image from the wreckage of a collapsed economy.  Detroit was cars, and our car culture has failed us, and so it must seem justifiable and cathartic to blame Detroit for the mess we’re in.

But Detroit is people, just like Pittsburgh and Baltimore are people.  When industries erode, the character of the cities that fueled those industries is disrupted — sometimes for decades.  (Hell, Pittsburgh’s been voted America’s Most Livable City and you still can’t get people to take it seriously.)

So how is it that Americans can write off whole sections of their own country, and delight in their fellow citizens’ struggles?

How do we not yet understand, in the 21st Century, that our nation is a composite of its best and worst, its brightest and dimmest, and that every city is caught somewhere in the cycle between prosper and collapse?

How can we sit back smugly while a city implodes and say “I told you so” or “They had it coming” or “Thank God I don’t live there”?

You don’t want to save Detroit?  Or Pittsburgh?  Or Baltimore, Cleveland, Youngstown, Buffalo…?  You’d rather write them off, and let the people you think were too stupid to escape while they had a chance now play catch-up for the next few years, or decades?

No worries.

Detroit will bounce back.  The blue collar cities have a backbone, and the people who live there take pride in who they are and what they do — even if what they do changes with the rise and fall of industries.  They’ll survive.

Artists will see a story in Detroit, and they’ll move there to create.  Investors will see opportunity in Detroit, and they’ll build there because it’s affordable.  Families will see their futures in Detroit, and they’ll lay down roots there because they want their children to be from somewhere with a history and a horizon.

Say what you will about the plight of the Rust Belt, but it was there before you were, and it’ll be here after you’re gone.

And if you can’t get behind that image of America, convincing you might not be worth the effort.

If social media is one big conversation, then persuasion is one key to propelling that conversation forward.  If nobody ever agrees on anything, we’ll never move beyond the same presumptions we began with, and our present state will never change — at least not on purpose.

Yet, having witnessed just how ineffective people actually are at persuading others to see things from their point of view, it’s no wonder that social media (with its added crutch of anonymity) too often descends into a shouting match between choirs.

You’re Never Too Small to Be Petty

Last month, my girlfriend Ann and I attended a neighborhood meeting of dog-walkers (and their opponents) to discuss the viability of an off-leash area in Baltimore’s Patterson Park.  (Having previously lived five minutes away from the sizable off-leash area in Pittsburgh’s Frick Park, we continue to be baffled by Baltimore’s comparative dog-unfriendliness; the Patterson Park OLA debate has evidently been raging for years.)

The meeting consisted of about 40 people, 80% of whom (I estimate) were either dog owners or dog-walkers.  (This makes sense, since that’s group who’s trying to effect change; their opponents merely need to rely on the inertia of the status quo, which requires considerably less effort.)

And yet, despite this being a meeting to discuss the viability (or not) of a dozen sites specified as possible locations for the OLA, proponents of the action wound up having to once again defend the merit of the idea itself, as the minority of anti-OLA participants dismissed site after site for one reason or another.  Their logic (or lack thereof) is specific to this debate, but each tactic can be applied to other, broader arguments about anything you so desire.  For example:

• Insist that “most people” would also see things your way. Initial objections to most proposed OLA sites included complaints that “people living near the park don’t want to look at that,” “people take their kids to the park,” “this will ruin the parking situation,” and “dogs smell, and I shouldn’t have to smell that.”  As one woman on the pro-OLA side said, the bulk of these objections made her feel as though she was requesting permission to do something immoral.
• Overplay the fear factor. Since kids walk through the park at all hours of the day, and since kids have a tendency to get mauled by dogs, the argument proceeded that the off-leash area shouldn’t be open during any time that kids could possibly be in the park.  Also, the OLA should in no way border the children’s fenced-in play area, because… well, it was never specified.  Presumably, either the dogs would leap over the fence and eat the kids, or the kids would tunnel under the fence to be eaten by the dogs.  Either way, dogs are savages.
• Find the common ground (from which you can make your opponent look bad). One woman who continually objected to the entire OLA proposal became the target of complaints and derision from the pro-OLA majority, so she decided to set the record straight.  Her reasoning could be paraphrased as follows: “I also happen to be a dog owner, but before I got my dog, I took the time to research which breeds would be right for me.  Those of you who knowingly bought or adopted dogs that you now say need more exercise than you can provide for them in your apartment, or with your work schedule, should have been more responsible in selecting your dog because you knew the rules beforehand.”  (Or, as I interpreted her: Things are the way they are, so stop making us adapt to your needs.)
• When in doubt, marginalize your opponent as “the other.” In this case, the 7 or 8 people who vehemently oppose the creation of an off-leash area insisted that dog-walkers were “a very small minority” of the park’s overall userbase, and therefore the larger majority of users shouldn’t have to disrupt their routines to accommodate the minority’s whims.  This, despite a study referenced at the meeting that showed dog-walkers are actually one of the largest user groups of the park.  (Remember: evidence is only evidence until someone calls it a lie; then it immediately becomes irrelevant.)
• Make Concessions Based Upon the Presumption That the Worst-Case Scenario Is Inevitable. Among the many elements debated, one of the most interesting was the possible hours for the off-leash area.  As mentioned above, having dogs off-leash (even in a fenced-in area) while kids are in the park was a concern, but so was the noise factor of barking, the potential disruption to the established routines of morning and evening joggers, and numerous other ways dogs could conceivably wreak havoc on America.  In the end, the anti-OLA minority decided that it would be best to only allow the OLA to be accessed at night, in the dark, preferably between 9 and 11 PM, and not at all during the summer.  (As the aforementioned “also happen to be a dog owner” explained, “You’re asking for the off-leash area to be open for four hours in the morning and four hours in the evening?  I don’t think anyone owns a dog that needs to play outside for eight hours every day.”)

And if All Else Fails, Remember: Compromise Is for Suckers

Keep in mind that Patterson Park currently consists of 137 acres, or 5,967,720 square feet.  Of that, current proposals for an off-leash area request space between 10,000 and 20,000 square feet.  That’s a maximum of 0.3 percent of the park’s total acreage — yet opponents of the action claim that’s still too much for them to sacrifice.  (If we’re looking to keep things strictly fair, I’m not sure what percentage of the park’s users are dog-walkers, but I’d wager it’s larger than 0.3 percent.)

Lesson learned: when it comes to self-interest, common sense goes out the window.  (Also: if setting aside park space for an off-leash area is this contentious, I can only imagine what the people debating health care, gay marriage or Afghanistan are putting up with…)

This weekend, I attended my first Small Press Expo, which is (according to its website) North America’s Premiere Independent Cartooning and Comic Book Arts Festival.  My friends Rachel and Josh went last year and they loved it, and since Baltimore is only an hour away from the event’s Bethesda ballroom, I joined them on this year’s trip down from Pittsburgh.

Being surrounded by hundreds of comic book creators, cartoonists, illustrators, publishers, writers, critics and fans was truly exhilarating, and not just because I’m a longtime comics fan who appreciates the indie scene.  A roomful of inspiration, creativity and self-actualization is naturally infectious, and meeting other creative people always makes me want to create something myself.  Thus, I end up leaving these types of events with a million new thoughts swirling in my head (and, in this case, a mini-comic about mermaid love gone wrong).

Some things I noticed, which may be applicable to your event / business / frame of mind:

People respect you when you do it yourself. Regardless of how talented you are, people admire anyone with the pluck to try something on their own, much less anyone who can earn a living on their own terms.  “Being an artist” is a universally romantic yet seldom-realized dream, so an event like this gives everyone who attends a chance to support those people who are brave (or delusional) enough to make their own rules.  (That said, it does help if you’re actually talented; people are far more inclined to support someone whom they personally think deserves to “make it.”)

Making money is allowed.  (Encouraged, even.) Unlike other web content creators who seem reluctant or unable to charge for their work, the vendors at SPX are unashamed to charge for their creations — and the attendees are unoffended.  Since everyone involved is either self-published or allied with a small press, all purchases help support people who make art for a living.  Nearly everyone I saw had purchased something, and lots of people were sitting happily on the floor outside the main exhibition hall, reading through their fresh stacks of brand new comics.

If there’s something for everyone, everyone leaves happy. No matter your tastes, this event had a book for you.  Vendors were selling comics about super heroes, sci-fi, fantasy, comedy, relationships, biography, parody, ninjas, animals, kids, horror, history, surfing, pornography and pin-up girls — and everything in-between.  If you couldn’t find something worth your time at SPX, you weren’t paying attention.  (How many events can you honestly say that about?)

Develop a coverage strategy when attending large events. Since this was my first time to SPX (and since I was conveniently broke and therefore unable to indulge my appetite for reading material), I was content to wander the floor and observe.  Rachel made two passes through the room — once to reconnoiter without buying anything, and then a second swoop to make her actual purchases.  And Josh beelined directly for the books he already knew he wanted in advance, making all his major purchases in the first half hour and then returning to explore the $5-and-under offerings.  Having pre-set expectations helped each of us find what we wanted, and we all left happy.*

There’s only so much time to talk. Josh zipped through the event without engaging anyone he didn’t want to talk to, stopping only at the tables of the artists whose work he already admired or whose work kept his attention for longer than a moment.  On the other hand, Rachel and I moseyed from table to table, inevitably getting embroiled in conversations with the artists about their work, their lives and their print quality.  If you’re in a hurry and don’t want to get trapped in endless conversations, be spatially aware of when a vendor has no one else nearby to speak to and nothing else physically to do — those are the times you’re most likely to get waylaid.

Longevity trumps talent. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: if you keep doing something long enough, even if you’re an average talent, you’ll eventually be respected as a veteran.  You can’t help but acquire knowledge over the years, and that wisdom — coupled with your obvious hard-nosed grit — will earn you generations of fans who admire you simply for fighting the good fight.  (Again, it helps to actually be talented, but it helps even more to get out of bed every morning and do whatever it takes to keep going.  Talent is singular, but tenacity is something we all like to believe we can achieve; when you do, you become inspirational.)

Different price points provide fans with different opportunities to support you. Dedicated fans are happy to pay $20 or more for your work.  People who’ve never heard of you (but like what they see) would prefer to pay less.  And products under $5 let people take a chance on your work without incurring much risk, or to support you fiscally even if they’re not your biggest fans artistically.

Be personable. I realize that people who create comics for a living are trained to express themselves non-verbally, but events like this are a showcase of talent and personality.  As interested as I am in your work, I’d rather talk to you for thirty seconds than watch you ink a page of your next issue.  I can always buy that issue later; I can’t talk to you again until next year.  (I know, I know: “There’s a thing called the Internet.”  But it’s not the same.)

Give me a reminder. People moving through an event like this are going to see a lot of media all at once.  They’ll be overwhelmed.  Provide them with a freebie so they can find you online later and learn more about your work at a time when they’re less informationally challenged.

We need more events like this. Not just for comics, but for all fields, artistic and beyond.  The communal energy of SPX is reminiscent of the kinetic energy at the first PodCamp, which started out as a meet-up for people who make web media.  The opportunity for like-minded individuals to meet in a common space and share their expertise with peers is rare, but the benefits — both professionally and intellectually — are worth the effort.

*  Admittedly, I didn’t have nearly enough expendable cash for an artistic smorgasbord like this.  Judging by the line waiting to access the ATM, neither did a lot of other people.  I should start a trust fund for next year.