Great Expectations

When I was in 9th grade, while reading "Great Expectations," my English teacher gave us this assignment: write your own obituary. (More uplifting content to come.) The one detail that I knew right then and there for a fact—that had to make it into my morbid class assignment—was the following: “Julia Baron was an established artist.”

Today, I’m not an established artist. Or the other roles I planned to be over the years:

A poet. A professor. A showrunner. A fiction writer. A scriptwriter.?

These days, I’m not even the pinball I once was, darting about and dizzying myself within the media world (Promos—5 points! Branded content—10 points! Long-form docu-series—20 points!).

I have worked with many extremely talented, smart, driven colleagues and mentors during my career at big networks like Nickelodeon, A&E, Food Network, Lifetime, MTV, and small production companies like Small Giant, and revered strategy/design agencies like Gretel. Most of those jobs and many of the people who I worked with day in and out were outstanding.

But I have also encountered toxic work situations. I’ve been screamed at by an older male editor who told me he was sick of taking directions from younger female producers. I’ve been dismissed by co-workers. I’ve seen jobs that were made for me but given to less experienced, more charismatic people. I’ve been on my best behavior, worked on-call around the clock, and at times made myself sick because I didn’t feel I could stop running on the hamster wheel long enough to use the bathroom or eat a meal. Some of it has been more traumatic because they've made me question who I can trust: forming a bond (even a friendship it seemed) with a mentor/ECD who initially implored me to join her agency, carving out a role specifically for me, only to, when budgets got tight, ghosted me during my Zoom layoff, and never reached out to me once.

I’ve spent most of my life trying to prove my worth.?

I miss being in a creative field, but I’ve come to realize the answer I would now give to that 9th grade assignment: “Julia Baron grew to be a confident person who worked with supportive, collaborative colleagues, in a thoughtful, healthy environment that championed her wellbeing, that encouraged her pursuits, that saw and celebrated her.”

I’ve learned that sometimes professional fulfillment doesn’t come in the work you do, but in the people you do it with and the environment you do it in.?

I’ve discovered this over the past year working as a writer in an industry I knew nothing about, with an amazing, supportive, understanding and trusting team at Hostfully , a software company that builds solutions for those working in the vacation rental industry.

This realization has solidified in the last six months during which time I learned of my cancer diagnosis. I immediately told my supervisors because I knew they would support me. And I was right. My team has been nothing short of amazing. They not only gave me time off for my first surgery— they insisted I take a month to recover. They knew I would otherwise try to push myself to return sooner because that’s my M.O. And they made sure I prioritized myself before them.

Since April 4th when I got my cancer diagnosis, I’ve gone through a major surgery, 12 weeks of chemo, nearly 50 doctors appointments, scans, consults, therapy sessions, blood panels, EKGs, PET Scans, and treatments. I will continue to have a standing injection every three weeks through mid 2025. I will continue to be on medication, and need consults and screenings and ultrasounds and tests til the cows come home.?

And today, October 9th, I have my second big surgery. For the first time in a very long time, the part of me that feared telling my employer about needing (more) time off, or worried I had to prove my worth, or tried to figure out a way to come back to work tomorrow, was silenced. I was able to silence it. It’s taken this long to feel valued not just for a one-off idea or script or late-night stay at the office, but as a person. A person who works best, functions best, survives best when she is bolstered by a culture built on actual understanding—not just paying lip service to it in one-off team building retreats or thought leadership posts (no offense team builders and thought leaders).?

Thank you to my current employer, Hostfully . Thank you to my colleagues from new hires to co-founders for seeing my skills and trusting my expertise. Thank you for never once doubting my hard work. Thank you for giving me the time and space to spend with family, to pick up my kid, to say yes to doctor appointments, to take time to heal and rest and recover and rest and recover again, and to pursue new interests (hello Japanese weaving, hi again playwriting!), to value my work because I’m encouraged by you to value my life.?

If you’re in a position of power, you will get better work out of people who feel held and seen by you. If you’re waiting on those doctor appointments because “it’s really busy at work right now,” you may want to consider de-programming that voice. If you’re hoping to be fulfilled creatively by your job, ok, that’s cool. I get it. But if you get burnt out by them, or realize your creativity can be discovered and nurtured elsewhere, or you’ve —quite frankly—worked for decades in an industry that doesn’t seem to have a place for you right now like many of my talented, brillant ex-colleagues have experienced, you’re not alone.

I’ve had to reinvent myself, or maybe just find new parts of myself. The truth is, I couldn’t write an obituary with a one-liner about my career. It’s not linear. It’s not what I thought it would be. It doesn’t define me; it lets me define and discover and delve into myself. And somewhere in there, artistic fulfillment is not only possible—it’s pure.