I’m in this weird competitive mind-space about what I do. There’s another writer in town who is always one step ahead of me, doing the large branding projects, working with the right clients, charging more than I do, the golden-child of freelance writing. I call him Piper.

I’m in a meeting the other day about a series of brochures and I inquire as to whether they have brand standards. Of course they do and they were written by him.

He is my Newman. Whenever Newman would do something that goaded Jerry Seinfeld, he’d say, “Newman!”

“Piper!” she says, gritting her teeth.

It was just discovered that the design of a website I’m writing is nearly identical to another website. Same historical content and theme: honoring war veterans. So a redesign is underway. The producer is debating how to inform the client.

With so much information out there and the derivative nature of nearly everything creative, how do you create something truly original?

There’s a design firm in town that I used to work with frequently. I did something to piss off their brand strategist, an intelligent go-getter of a woman, not unlike myself. Rather than telling me what I did wrong, they just stopped working with me. I heard through the grapevine three years later that I “gave up” on the project.

I know that I wasn’t fully present for the project. I had many big personal issues going down. It’s hard to separate personal from professional when big life questions want answers. I could have handled the situation better, and regret my lack of professionalism.

Now this situation is biting back. I want to do more work for this design firm. They’re great at what they do, producing big budget projects for national clients. My renewed focus on branding makes me a good fit for this company. How do I get back in their favor? Will they give me a second chance?

This issue raised two thoughts. One, freelance people often don’t get second chances. Piss off a creative director or brand strategist and it’s hard to get back in the door. Two, women are extra critical of other women. Ever watched a woman stare down another woman, especially if she’s wearing a pair of shoes she covets? Go to any public place, sit on a bench and watch how women watch each other.

I’ve yet to figure out how to handle this.

The pitch went well. I felt like we connected about writing and working for customers rather than creativity’s sake. Had a good discussion of the strengths and weaknesses of my portfolio.

The company is egg.

I’m enchanted by their goal to work with socially and environmentally responsible brands, to pick companies that encourage people not to consume more but to consume better.

I’m pitching my book tomorrow to an ad agency and I’ve decided to show only the kind of work that I want to do. We’ll see where this strategy leads.

I get 80% of my business from graphic designers. I’ve worked with many of the design firms in the city. I’ll tell you one thing, if you piss off someone once, auf wiedersehen. You’re not an employee, so interfere with their ego and you won’t be coming back.

This is one thing I dislike about the industry. It lowers the quality of the work. I started in the ad business and every great writer I ever worked with was a huge part of a powerful campaign. Good writing makes all the difference, and most design firms recognize this.

Once I was late for a kick-off meeting with a new design firm and client. It was a particularly bad time in my life. I had a 12 month-old child who I was still figuring out (translation: silly brain soup from sleep deprivation), my mother was undergoing chemotherapy for breast cancer and my mother-in-law was selling the ancestral homeland, an inspiring slice of waterfront property I’d called home for eight years.

So I’m late for a meeting because I totally forget that it started at noon. I don’t leave my house until 11:30 and it takes an hour to get there. I call from the road and inform them that I’m going to be late. I get to the meeting and it’s awkward but I get the gist of the project and have the opportunity to ask my questions. End of meeting and everything seems okay. But the relationship between moi and the account manager is sour from the get go.

Through the grapevine I learn that the account manager and others at the design firm feel that I did not appropriately apologize for being late. The chemical reaction fizzles, and I get very few future jobs from this group, despite that the client picked my campaign direction and that the brainstorming sessions were some of the most inspired I’ve worked on, and that I cheerfully revised the copy six times. I kept thinking that my creativity and hard work would override the initial guffaw.

I understand that’s how this industry works but it underscores a harsh reality of freelance copywriting. You are disposable. It doesn’t matter if your ideas are the one the client picks. Or if you’ve got four sellable ideas to your design partner’s one. Or if the client loves you. You’re screwed if you don’t kiss ass enough.

Not since Mr. Flint’s ninth-grade course has chemistry meant so much to me. This is not a torrid crush and intense memorization of the table of elements made in an effort to impress. This is stuff of alchemy.

At 1:15PM PST, Motive Design Research closed their doors. I am sad because that chemistry experiment is over.

I worked with this design firm since day one. For eight years, I watched them hire designers, fire designers, add a partner, get bigger, produce amazingly fresh work, downsize due to the tech bust and struggle to bring in new clients. And I just watched them close their doors for good.

They are responsible for the most beautiful, thoughtful and well-designed samples in my book. One partner went to Starbucks. The other is at a prominent design firm. I am still here, working from the top floor of my house, trying to figure out how I’m going to replace the Motive revenue stream. More importantly, will I have that type of creative chemistry again?